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ONE DAY, AS WE WERE WALKING OVER THE FIELDS, I TOLD HIM THE 
WHOLE STORY 



Wilfrid Cumbermede 


AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL STORY 


BY 

GEORGE MACDONALD 

AUTHOR OF “ ANNALS OF A QUIET NEIGHBORHOOD,” " ALEC FORBES,” 

“ROBERT FALCONER,” ETC. 


WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 




PHILADELPHIA: 

DAVID McKAY, PUBLISHER, 

6io SOUTH WASHINGTON SQUARE. 





CONTENTS 


PAGE 


INTRODUCTION 1 

Chapter I. 

WHERE I FIND MYSELF 5 

Chapter II. 

MY uncle and aunt 12 

Chapter III. 

AT THE TOP OF THE CHIMNEY-STAIR 15 

Chapter IV. 

THE PENDULUM 20 

Chapter V. 

I have LESSONS 30 

I 

Chapter VI. 

I COBBLE 37 

Chapter VII. 

THE SWORD ON THE WALL 39 

Chapter VIII. 

I GO TO SCHOOL, AND GRANNIE LEAVES IT... 50 


iii 


IV 


CONTENTS. 


Chapter IX. 

PAQB 

I SIN AND REPENT 58 

Chapter X. 

I BUILD CASTLES 71 

Chapter XI. 

A talk with my uncle 85 

Chapter XII. 

THE HOUSE-STEWARD 93 

Chapter XIII. 

THE LEADS 108 

Chapter XIV. 

THE GHOST 120 

Chapter XV. 

AWAY 127 

Chapter XVI. 

THE ice-cave 134 

Chapter XVII. 

AMONG THE MOUNTAINS 140 

Chapter XVIII. 

again the ice-cave 157 

Chapter XIX. 

CHARLEY NURSES ME 165 

Chapter XX. 

A DREAM 169 


CONTENTS. 


V 


Chapter XXI. 

PAGE 

THE FROZEN STREAM 173 

Chapter XXII. 

AN EXPLOSION 178 

Chapter XXIII. 

ONLY A LINK 185 

Chapter XXIV. 

CHARLEY AT OXFORD 19; 

Chapter XXV. 

MY white mare 203 

Chapter XXVI. 

A RIDING LESSON 212 

Chapter XXVII. 

A DISAPPOINTMENT 224 

Chapter XXVIII. 

IN LONDON 231 

Chapter XXIX. 

changes 242 

Chapter XXX. 

PROPOSALS 246 

Chapter XXXI. 

ARRANGEMENTS 252 

Chapter XXXII. 

PREPARATIONS 260 


vi 


CONTENTS. 


Chapter XXXIII. 

PAGE 

ASSISTANCE 268 

Chapter XXXIV. 

AN EXPOSTULATION 274 

Chapter XXXV. 

A TALK WITH CHARLEY 282 

Chapter XXXVI. ‘ 

TAPESTRY 291 

Chapter XXXVII. 

THE OLD CHEST 307 

Chapter XXXVIII. 

MARY OSBORNE 312 

Chapter XXXIX. 

A STORM 320 

Chapter XL. 

A DREAM 327 

Chapter XLI. 

A WAKING 330 

Chapter XLII. 

A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE 334 

Chapter XLIII. 

THE SWORD IN THE SCALE 348 

Chapter XLIV. 

I PART WITH MY SWORD 361 


CONTENTS. Vii 

Chapter XLV. 

PAGE 

UMBERDEN CHURCH 369 

Chapter XLVI. 

MY FOLIO 376 

Chapter XL VII. 

THE LETTERS AND THEIR STORY 380 

Chapter XLVIII. 

ONLY A LINK 385 

Chapter XLIX. 

A DISCLOSURE 389 

Chapter L. 

THE DATES 397 * 

ClIAPTER LI. 

CHARLEY AND CLARA 401 

Chapter LII. 

LILITH MEETS WITH A MISFORTUNE 407 

Chapter LIII. 

TOO late 415 

Chapter LIV. 

ISOLATION 428 

Chapter LV. 

ATTEMPTS AND COINCIDENCES 432 

Chapter LVI. 

THE LATE VISION 440 


viii 


CONTENTS. 


Chapter LVII. 

PAGB 

ANOTHER DREAM 448 

Chapter LVIII. 

THE DARKEST HOUR 454 

Chapter LIX. 

THE DAWN 460 

Chapter LX. 

MY GREAT-GRANDMOTHER 466 

Chapter LXI. 

THE PARISH REGISTER 472 

Chapter LXII. 

A FOOLISH TRIUMPH 477 

Chapter LXIII. 

A COLLISION 484 

Chapter LXIV. 

YET ONCE 490 

Chapter LXV. 

CONCLUSION 495 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE 


AN AUTOBIOGEAPHICAL STOEY. 


INTRODUCTION. 

I AM — I will not say how old, but well past middle age. 
This much I feel compelled to mention, because it has long 
been my opinion that no man should attempt a history of him- 
self until he has set foot upon the border-land where the past 
and the future begin to blend in a consciousness somewhat in- 
dependent of both, and hence interpreting both. Looking 
westward, from this vantage-ground, the setting sun is not the 
less lovely to him that he recalls a merrier time when the 
shadows fell the other way. Then they sped westward before 
him, as if to vanish, chased by his advancing footsteps, over 
the verge of the world. Now they come creeping towards him, 
lengthening as they come. And they are welcome. Can it be 
that he would ever have chosen a world without shadows? 
Was not the trouble of the shadowless noon the dreariest of 
all? Did he not then long for the curtained queen — ^the all- 
shadowy night? And shall he now regard with dismay the 
setting sun of his earthly life? When he looks back, he sees 


2 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


the farthest cloud of the sun-deserted east alive with a rosy 
hue. It is the prophecy of the sunset concerning the dawn. 
For the sun itself is ever a rising sun, and the morning will 
come though the night should be dark. 

In this “season of calm weather,” when the past has receded 
so far that he can behold it as in a picture, and his share in it 
as the history of a man who had lived and would soon die ; 
when he can confess his faults without the bitterness of shame, 
both because he is humble, and because the faults themselves 
have dropped from him ; when his good deeds look poverty- 
stricken in his eyes, and he would no more claim consideration 
for them than expect knighthood because he was no thief; 
when he cares little for his reputation, but much for his cha- 
racter — little for what has gone beyond his control, but end- 
lessly much for what yet remains in his will to determine ; 
then, I think, a man may do well to write his own life. 

“So,” I imagine a reader interposing, “you profess to have 
arrived at this high degree of perfection yourself?” 

I reply that the man who has attained this kind of indiffer- 
ence to the past, this kind of hope in the future, will be far 
enough from considering it a high degree of perfection. The 
very idea is to such a man ludicrous. One may eat bread 
without claiming the honors of an athlete; one may desire to 
be honest, and not count himself a saint. My object in thus 
shadowing out what seems to me my present condition of mind, 
is merely to render it intelligible to my readers how an auto- 
biography might come to be written without rendering the 
writer justly liable to the charge of that overweening, or self- 
conceit, which might be involved in the mere conception of 
the idea. 

In listening to similar recitals from the mouths of elderly 
people, I have observed that many things which seemed to 
the persons principally concerned ordinary enough, had to me 
a wonder and a significance they did not perceive. Let me 
hope that some of the things I am about to relate may fare 
similarly, although, to be honest, I must confess I could not 
have undertaken the task — for a task it is— upon this chance 


INTRODUCTION. 


3 


alone : I do think some of my history worthy of being told 
just for the facts’ sake. God knows I have had small share 
in that worthiness. The weakness of my life has been that I 
would ever do some great thing; the saving of my life has 
been my utter failure. I have never done a great deed. If I 
had, I know that one of my temperament could not have 
escaped serious consequences. I have had more pleasure, when 
a grown man, in a certain discovery concerning the ownership 
of an apple of which I had taken the ancestral bite when a boy, 
than I can remember to have resulted from any action of my 
own during my whole existence. But I detest the notion of 
puzzling my readers in order to enjoy their fancied surprise, or 
their possible praise of a worthless ingenuity of concealment. 
If I ever appear to behave to them thus, it is merely that I 
follow the course of my own knowledge of myself and my af- 
fairs, without any desire to give them either the pain or the 
pleasure of suspense, if indeed I may flatter myself with the 
hope of interesting them to such a degree that suspense should 
become possible. 

When I look over what I have written, I find the tone so 
sombre — ^let me see: what sort of an evening is it on which I 
commence this book? Ah! I thought so: a sombre evening. 
The sun is going down behind a low bank of gray cloud, the 
upper edge of which he tinges with a faded yellow. There will 
be rain before morning. It is late autumn, and most of the 
crops are gathered in. A bluish fog is rising from the lower 
meadows. As I look I grow cold. It is not, somehow, an in- 
teresting evening. Yet if I found just this evening well de- 
scribed in a novel, I should enjoy it heartily. The poorest, 
weakest drizzle upon the window-panes of a dreary road-side 
inn, in a country of slate-quarries, possesses an interest to him 
who enters it by the door of a book, hardly less than the pour- 
ing rain which threatens to swell every brook to a torrent. 
How is this? I think it is because your troubles do not enter 
into the book, and its troubles do not enter into you, and 
therefore Nature operates upon you unthwarted by the personal 
conditions which so often counteract her present influences. 


4 


INTRODUCTION. 


But I will rather shut out the fading west, the gathering misti% 
and the troubled consciousness of Nature altogether, light my 
fire and my pipe, and then try whether in my first chapter I 
cannot be a boy again in such fashion that my ghostly com- 
panion, that is, my typical reader, will not be too impatient to 
linger a little in the meadows of childhood ere we pass to the 
corn-fields of riper years. 


WHERE I FIND MYSELF. 


5 


CHAPTER 1. 

WHERE I FIND MYSELF. 

No wisest chicken, I presume, can recall the first moment 
when the chalk-oval surrounding it gave way, and instead of 
the cavern of limestone which its experience might have led it 
to expect, it found a world of air and movement and freedom 
and blue sky — with kites in it. For mj own part, I often 
wished when a child, that I had watched while God was 
making me, so that I might have remembered how he did it. 
Now my wonder is whether when I creep forth into “that new 
world which is the old,” I shall be -conscious of the birth, and 
enjoy the whole mighty surprise, or whether I shall become 
gradually aware that things are changed, and stare about me 
like the new-born baby. What will be the candlcrflame that 
shall first attract my new-born sight? But I forget that 
speculation about the new life is not writing the history of 
the old. 

I have often tried how far back my memory could go. I 
suspect there are awfully ancient shadows mingling with our 
memories ; but, as far as I can judge, the earliest definite me- 
mory I have is the discovery of how the wind was made ; for I 
saw the process going on before my very eyes, and there could 
be, and there was, no doubt of the relation of cause and effect 
in the matter. There were the trees swaying themselves about 
after the wildest fashion, and there was the wind in consequence 
visiting my person somewhat too roughly. The trees were 
blowing in my face. They made the wind, and threw it at 
me. I used my natural senses, and this was what they told 
me. The discovery impressed me so deeply that even now I 
cannot look upon trees without a certain indescribable, and, but 
for this remembrance, unaccountable awe. A grove was to me 
for many years a fountain of wind, and, in the stillest day, to 


6 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


look into a depth of gathered stems filled me with dismay ; for 
the whole awful assembly might, writhing together in earnest 
and efiectual contortion, at any moment begin their fearful 
task of churning the wind. 

There were no trees in the neighborhood of the house where 
I was born. It stood in the midst of grass, and nothing but 
grass was to be seen for a long way on every side of it. There 
was not a gravel path or a road near it. Its walls, old and 
rusty, rose immediately from the grass. Green blades and a 
few heads of daisies leaned trustingly against the brown stone, 
all the sharpness of whose fractures had long since vanished, 
worn away by the sun and the rain, or filled up by the slow 
lichens, which I used to think were young stones growing out 
of the wall. The ground w^as part of a very old dairy-farm, 
and my uncle, to whom it belonged, would not have a path about 
the place. But then the grass was well subdued by the cows, 
and, indeed, I think, would never have grown very long, for it 
was of that delicate sort which we see only on downs and in 
parks and on old grazing farms. All about the house — as 
far, at least, as my lowly eyes could see — the ground was per- 
fectly level, and this lake of greenery, out of which it rose like 
a solitary rock, was to me an unfailing mystery and delight. 
This will sound strange in the ears of those who consider a 
mountainous, or at least an undulating surface, essential to 
beauty ; but nature is altogether independent of what is called 
fine scenery. There are other organs than the eyes, even if 
grass and water and sky were not of the best and loveliest of 
Nature’s show. 

The house, I have said, was of an ancient-looking stone, gray 
and green and yellow and brown. It looked very hard ; yet 
there were some attempts at carving about the heads of the 
narrow windows. The carving had, however, become so dull 
and shadowy, that I could not distinguish a single form or se- 
parable portion of design: still some ancient thought seemed 
ever flickering across them. The house, which was two stories 
in height, had a certain air of defence about it, ill to explain. 
It had no eaves, for the walls rose above the edge of the roof; 


WHERE I FIND MYSELF. 


7 


but the hints at battlements were of the merest. The roof, co- 
vered with gray slates, rose very steep, and had narrow, tall 
dormer windows in it. The edges of the gables rose, not in a 
slope, but in a succession of notches, like stairs. Altogether, 
the shell to which, considered as a crustaceous animal, I be- 
longed — ^for man is every animal, according as you choose to 
contemplate him — had an old-world look about it — a look of 
the time when men had to fight in order to have peace, to kill 
in order to live. Being, however, a crustaceous animal, I, the 
heir of all the new impulses of the age, was born and reared in 
closest neighborhood with strange relics of a vanished time. 
Humanity so far retains its chief characteristics, that the new 
generations can always flourish in the old shell. 

The dairy was at some distance, so deep in a hollow, that a 
careless glance would not have discovered it. I well remember 
my astonishment when my aunt first took me there ; for I had 
not even observed the depression of surface: all had been a le- 
vel green to my eyes. Beyond this hollow were fields divided 
by hedges, and lanes, and the various goings to and fro of a not 
unpeopled although quiet neighborhood. Until I left home for 
school, however, I do not remember to have seen a carriage of 
any kind approach our solitary dwelling. My uncle would 
have regarded it as little short of an insult for any one to drive 
wheels over the smooth lawny surface in which our house dwelt 
like a solitary island in the sea. 

Before the threshold lay a brown patch, worn bare of grass, 
and beaten hard by the descending feet of many generations. 
The stone threshold itself was worn almost to a level with it. 
A visitor’s first step was into what would, in some parts, be 
called the house-place, a room which served all the purposes 
of a kitchen, and yet partook of the character of an old hall. 
It rose to a fair height, with smoke-stained beams above, and 
was floored with a kind of cement, hard enough, and yet so 
worn, that it required a good deal of local knowledge to avoid 
certain jars of the spine from sudden changes of level. All 
the furniture was dark and shining, especially the round table, 
which, with its bewildering, spider-like accumulation of legs, 


8 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


waited under the mullioned, lozenged window until meal-times, 
when, like an animal roused from its lair, it stretched out those 
legs, and assumed expanded and symmetrical shape in front 
of the fire in winter, and nearer the door in summer. It recalls 
the vision of my aunt, with a hand at each end of it, searching 
empirically for the level — ^feeling for it, that is, with the crea- 
ture’s own legs— before lifting the hanging leaves, and drawing 
out the hitherto supernumerary legs to support them ; after 
which would come a fresh adjustment of level, another hustling 
to and fro, that the new feet likewise might settle on elevations 
of equal height ; and then came the snowy cloth or the tea-tray, 
deposited cautiously upon its shining surface. 

The walls of this room were always whitewashed in the 
spring, occasioning ever a sharpened contrast with the dark 
brown ceiling. Whether that was even swept I do not know ; 
I do not remember ever seeing it done. At all events, its 
color remained unimpaired by paint or whitewash. On the 
walls hung various articles, some of them high above my 
head, and attractive for that reason if for no other. I never 
saw one of them moved from its place — ^not even the fishing- 
rod, which required the whole length betwixt the two windows ; 
three rusty hooks hung from it, and waved about when a wind 
entered ruder than common. Over the fishing-rod hung a 
piece of tapestry, about a yard in width, and longer than that. 
It would have required a very capable constructiveness indeed 
to supply the design from what remained, so fragmentary were 
the forms, and so dim and faded were the once bright colors. 
It was there as an ornament ; for that which is a mere comple- 
ment of higher modes of life, becomes, when useless, the orna- 
ment of lower conditions : what we call great virtues are little 
regarded by the saints. It was long before I began to think 
how the tapestry could have come there, or to what it owed the 
honor given it in the house. 

On the opposite wall hung another object, which may well 
have been the cause of my carelessness about the former — at- 
tracting to itself all my interest. It was a sword, in a leather 
sheath. From the point, half way to the hilt, the sheath was 


WHERE I FIND MYSELF. 


9 


split all along the edge of the weapon. The sides of the 
wound gaped, and the blade was visible to my prying eyes. 
It was with rust almost as dark a brown as the scabbard that 
enfolded it. But the under parts of the hilt, where dust could 
not settle, gleamed with a faint golden shine. That sword was 
to my childish eyes the type of all mystery, a clouded glory, 
which for many long years I never dreamed of attempting to 
unveil. Not the sword Excalibur, had it been “ stored in some 
treasure-house of mighty kings,” could have radiated more 
marvel into the hearts of young knights than that sword ra- 
diated into mine. Night after night I would dream of danger 
drawing nigh — crowds of men of evil purpose — enemies to me 
or to my country ; and ever in the beginning of my dream, I 
stood ready, foreknowing and waiting ; for I had climbed and 
had taken the ancient power from the wall, and had girded it 
about my waist — always with a straw rope, the sole band with- 
in my reach ; but as it went on, the power departed from the 
dream : I stood waiting for foes who would not come ; or they 
drew near in fury, and when I would have drawn my weapon, 
old blood and rust held it fast in its sheath, and I tugged at it 
m helpless agony ; and fear invaded my heart, and I turned 
and fled, pursued by my foes until I left the dream itself 
behind, whence the terror still pursued me. 

There were many things more on those walls. A pair of 
spurs, of make modem enough, hung between two pewter dish 
covers. Hanging book-shelves came next ; for although most 
of my uncle’s books were in his bed-room, some of the com- 
moner were here on the wall, next to an old fowling-piece, of 
which both lock and barrel were devoured with rust. Then 
came a great pair of shears, though how they should have 
been there I cannot yet think, for there was no garden to the 
house, no hedges or trees to clip. I need not linger over these 
things. Their proper place is in the picture with which I 
would save words and help understanding if I could. 

Of course there was a great chimney in the place ; chiefly 
to be mentioned from the singular fact that just round its 
comer was a little door opening on a rude winding stair of 


10 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE 


stone. This appeared to "be constructed within the chimney ; 
but on the outside of the wall was a half-round projection, 
revealing that the stair was not indebted to it for the whole of 
its accommodation. Whither tlie stair led, I shall have to 
disclose in my next chapter. From the opposite end of the 
kitchen, an ordinary wooden staircase, with clumsy balustrade, 
led up to the two bed-rooms occupied by my uncle and my 
aunt; to a large lumber-room, whose desertion and almost 
emptiness was a source of uneasiness in certain moods ; and to 
a spare bed-room, which was better furnished than any of 
ours, and indeed to my mind a very grand and spacious 
apartment. This last was never occupied during my child- 
hood ; consequently it smelt musty notwithstanding my aunt’s 
exemplary housekeeping. Its bedstead must have been hun- 
dreds of years old. Above these rooms again were those to 
which the dormer windows belonged, and in one of them I 
slept. It opened into that occupied by Nannie, our only 
maid. It had a deep closet in which I kept my few treasures, 
and into which I used to retire when out of temper or 
troubled, conditions not occurring frequently, for nobody 
quarrelled with me, and I had nobody with whom I might 
have quarrelled. 

When I climbed upon a chair, I could seat myself on the 
broad sill of the dormer window. This was the watch-tower 
whence I viewed the world. Thence I could see trees in the 
distance — too far off for me to tell whether they were churn- 
ing wind or not. On that side those trees alone were between 
me and the sky. 

One day when my aunt took me with her into the lumber- 
room, I found there, in a corner, a piece of strange mechan- 
ism. It had a kind of pendulum ; but I cannot describe it 
because I had lost sight of it long before I was capable of 
discovering its use, and my recollection of it is therefore very 
vague — far too vague to admit of even a conjecture now as to 
what it could have been intended for. But I remember well 
enough my fancy concerning it, though when or how that 
fancy awoke I cannot tell either. It seems to me as old as 


WHERE I FIND MYSELF. 


11 


the finding of the instrument. The fancy was that if I could 
keep the pendulum wagging long enough, it would set all 
those trees going too; and if I still kept it swinging, we 
should have such a storm of wind as no living man had ever 
felt or heard of. That I more than half believed it, will be 
evident from the fact that, although I frequently carried the 
pendulum as I shall call it, to the window sill, and set it in 
motion by way of experiment, I had not, up to the time of a 
certain incident which I shall very soon have to relate, had 
the courage to keep up the oscillations beyond ten or a dozen 
strokes; partly from fear of the trees, partly from a dim 
dread of exercising power whose source and extent were not 
within my knowledge. I kept the pendulum in the closet I 
have mentioned, and never spoke to any one of it. 


12 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER 11. 

MY UNCLE AND AUNT. 

We were a curious household. I remember neither father 
nor mother ; and the woman I had been taught to call auntie 
was no such near relation. My uncle was my father^s brother 
and my aunt was his cousin, by the mother’s side. She was 0 
tall, gaunt woman with a sharp nose and eager eyes, yet 
sparing of speech. Indeed, there was very little speech to be 
heard in the house. My aunt, however, looked as if she 
could have spoken. I think it was the spirit of the place that 
kept her silent, for there were those eager eyes. She might 
have been expected also to show a bad temper, but I never 
saw a sign of such. To me she was always kind ; chiefly, I 
allow, in a negative way, leaving me to do very much as I 
pleased. I doubt if she felt any great tenderness for me, 
although I had been dependent upon her care from infancy. 
In after years I came to the conclusion that she was in love 
with my uncle ; and perhaps the sense that he was indifferent 
to her save after a brotherly fashion, combined with the fear 
of betraying herself and the consciousness of her unattractive 
appearance, to produce the contradiction between her looks 
and her behaviour. 

Every morning, after our early breakfast, my uncle walked 
away to the farm, where he remained until dinner-time. 
Often, when busy at my own invented games in the grass, I 
have caught sight of my aunt, standing motionless with her 
hand over her eyes, watching for the first glimpse of my uncle 
ascending from the hollow where the farm buildings lay ; and 
occasionally, when something had led her thither as well, I 
would watch them returning together over the grass, when she 
would keep glancing up in his face at almost regular intervals, 
although it was evident they were not talking, but he never 


MY UNCLE AND AUNT. 


13 


turned his face or lifted his eyes from the ground a few yards 
in front of him. 

He was a tall man of nearly fifty, with gray hair, and 
quiet meditative blue eyes. He always looked as if he were 
thinking. He had been intended for the church, but the 
means for the prosecution of his studies failing, he had turned 
his knowledge of rustic affairs to account, and taken a subor- 
dinate position on a nobleman’s estate, where he rose to be 
bailiff*. When my father was seized with his last illness, he 
returned to take the management of the farm. It had been 
in the family for many generations. Indeed, that portion of 
it upon which the house stood was our own property. When 
my mother followed my father, my uncle asked his cousin to 
keep house for him. Perhaps she had expected a further 
request, but more had not come of it. 

When he came in, my uncle always went straight to his 
room ; and having washed his hands and face, took a book 
and sat down in the window. K I were sent to tell him that 
the meal was ready, I was sure to find him reading. He 
would look up, smile, and look down at his book again ; nor, 
until I had formally delivered my message, would he take 
further notice of me. Then he would rise, lay his book care- 
fully aside, take my hand, and lead me down stairs. 

To my childish eyes there was something very grand about 
my uncle. His face was large-featured and handsome; he 
was tall, and stooped meditatively. I think my respect for 
him was founded a good deal upon the reverential way in 
which my aunt regarded him. And there was great wisdom, 
I came to know, behind that countenance, a golden speech 
behind that silence. 

My reader must not imagine that the prevailing silence of 
the house oppressed me. I had been brought up in it, and 
never felt it. My own thoughts, if thoughts those conditions 
of mind could be called, which were chiefly passive results of 
external influences — whatever they were — thoughts or feelings, 
sensations, or dim, slow movements of mind — ^they filled the 
great pauses of speech ; and besides, I could read the faces of 


14 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


both my uncle and aunt like the pages of a well-known book. 
Every shade of alteration in them I was familiar with, for 
their changes were not many; 

Although my uncle’s habit was silence, however, he would 
now and then take a fit of talking to me. I remember many 
such talks ; the better, perhaps, that they were divided by 
long intervals. I had perfect confidence in his wisdom, and 
submission to his will. I did not much mind my aunt. Per- 
haps her deference to my uncle made me feel as if she and I 
were more on a level. She must have been really kind, for 
she never resented any petulance or carelessness. Possibly 
she sacrificed her own feeling to the love my uncle bore me ; 
but I think it was rather that, because he cared for me, she 
cared for me too. 

Twice during every meal she would rise from the table with 
some dish in her hand, open the door behind the chimney, and 
ascend the winding stair. 


AT THE TOP OF THE CHIMNEY-STAIR. 


15 


CHAPTER III. 

AT THE TOP OP THE CHIMNEY-STAIB. 

I FEAR my readers may have thought me too long occupied 
with the explanatory foundations of my structure : I shall at 
once proceed to raise its walls of narrative. Whatever 
further explanations may be necessary, can be applied as but- 
tresses in lieu of a broader base. 

One Sunday — it was his custom of a Sunday — I fancy I 
was then somewhere about six years of age — my uncle rose 
from the table after our homely dinner, took me by the hand, 
and led me to the dark door with the long arrow-headed 
hinges, and up the winding stone stair which I never ascended 
except with him or my aunt. At the top was another rugged 
door, and within that, one covered with green baize. The last 
opened on what had always seemed to me a very paradise of a 
room. It was old-fashioned enough ; but childhood is of any 
and every age, and it was not old-fashioned to me — only in- 
tensely cosy and comfortable. The first thing my eyes gen- 
erally rested upon was an old bureau, with a book-case on the 
top of it, the glass-doors of which were lined with faded red 
silk. The next thing I would see was a small tent-bed, with 
the whitest of curtains, and enchanting fringes of white ball- 
tassels. The bed was covered with an equally charming 
counterpane of silk patchwork. The next object was the 
genius of the place, in a high, close, easy-chair, covered with 
some dark stuff, against which her face, surrounded with its 
widow’s cap, of ancient form, but dazzling whiteness, was 
strongly relieved. How shall I describe the shrunken, yet 
delicate, the gracious, if not graceful form, and the face from 
which extreme old age had not wasted half the loveliness? 
Yet I always beheld it with an indescribable sensation, one of 
whose elements I can isolate and identify as a faint fear. 


16 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Perhaps this arose partly from the fact that, in going up the 
stair, more than once my uncle had said to me, “ You must 
not mind what grannie says, Willie, for old people will often 
speak strange things that young people cannot understand 
But you must love grannie, for she is a very good old lady.” 

“ Well, grannie, how are you to-day ?” said my uncle, as 
we entered, this particular Sunday. 

I may as well mention at once that my uncle called her 
grannie in his own right and not in mine, for she was in truth 
my great-grandmother. 

“ Pretty well, David, I thank you ; but much too long out 
of my grave,” answered grannie ; in no sepulchral tones, how- 
ever, for her voice, although weak and uneven, had a sound 
in it like that of one of the upper strings of a violin. The 
plaintiveness of it touched me, and I crept near her — nearer 
than, I believe, I had ever yet gone of my own will — and laid 
my hand upon hers. I withdrew it instantly, for there was 
something in the touch that made me — not shudder, exactly— 
but creep. Her hand was smooth and soft, and warm too, 
only somehow the skin of it seemed dead. With a quicker 
movement than belonged to her years, she caught hold of 
mine, which she kept in one of her hands, while she stroked it 
with the other. My slight repugnance vanished for the time, 
and I looked up in her face, grateful for a tenderness which 
was altogether new to me. 

“ What makes you so long out of your grave, grannie ?” I 
asked. 

“ They won’t let me into it, my dear.” 

Who won’t let you, grannie ?” 

“My own grandson there, and the woman down the stair” 

“ But you don’t really want to go — do you, grannie ?” 

“ I do want to go, Willie. I ought to have been there long 
ago. I am very old ; so old, that I’ve forgotten how old I 
am. How old am I ?” she asked, looking up at my uncle. 

“ Nearly ninety-five, grannie ; and the older you get before 
you go, the better we shall be pleased, as you know very 
well.” 


AT THE TOP OF THE CHIMNEY-STAIR. 


11 


“ There ! I told you,” she said with a smile, not all of plea- 
sure, as she turned her head towards me. “ They won’t let me 
go. I want to go to my grave, and they won’t let me! Is that 
an age at which to keep a poor woman from her grave ?” 

“ But it’s not a nice place, is it, grannie ?” I asked, with 
the vaguest ideas of what the grave meant. “ I think some- 
body told me it was in the church-yard.” 

But neither did I know with any clearness what the church 
itself meant, for we were a long way from church, and I had 
never been there yet. 

“ Yes, it is in the church-yard, my dear.” 

‘‘ Is it a house,” I asked. 

“ Yes, a little house; just big enough for one.” 

" I shouldn’t like that.” 

** Oh, yes, you would.” 

“ Is it a nice place, then ?” 

“ Yes, the nicest place in the world, when you get to be so 
old as I am. If they would only let me die I” 

“Die, grannie!” I exclaimed. My notions of death as yet 
were derived only from the fowls brought from the farm, with 
their necks hanging down long and limp, and their heads 
waggling hither and thither. 

“ Come, grannie, you mustn’t frighten our little man,” in- 
terposed my uncle, looking kindly at us both. 

“David!” said grannie, with a reproachful dignity, “yow 
know what I mean well enough. You know that until I have 
done what I have to do, the grave that is waiting for me will 
not open its mouth to receive me. If you will only allow me 
to do what I have to do, I shall .not trouble you long. Oh 
dear ! oh dear !” she broke out, moaning, and rocking herself 
to and fro, “ I am too old to weep, and they will not let me to 
my bed. I want to go to bed. I want to go to sleep.” 

She moaned and complained like a child. My uncle went 
near and took her hand. 

“Come, come, dear grannie!” he said, “you must not 
behave like this. You know all things are for the best.” 

“To keep a corpse out of its grave!” retorted the old lady 
2 


18 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


almost fiercely, only she was too old and weak to be fierce, 

Why should you keep a soul that’s longing to depart and go 
tQ its own people, lingering on in the coffin ? What better 
than a coffin is this withered body ? The child is old enough 
to understand me. Leave him with me for half an hour, and 
I shall trouble you no longer. I shall at least wait my end 
in peace. But I think I should die before the morning.” 

Ere grannie had finished this sentence, I had shrunk from 
her again and retreated behind my uncle. 

“ There !” she went on, ** you make my own child fear me. 
Don’t be frightened, Willie dear ; your old mother is not a 
wild beast ; she loves you dearly. Only my grand-children 
are so undutiful ! They will not let my own son come near 
me.” 

How I recall this I do not know, for I could not have 
understood it at the time. The fact is that during the last 
few years I have found pictures of the past returning upon 
me in the most vivid and unaccountable manner, so much so 
as almost to alarm me. Things I had utterly forgotten — or 
BO far at least that when they return they must appear only as 
vivid imaginations, were it not for a certain conviction of fact 
which accompanies them — are constantly dawning out of the 
past. Can it be that the decay of the observant faculties 
allows the memory to revive and gather force ? But I must 
refrain, for my business is to narrate, not to speculate. 

My uncle took me by the hand, and turned to leave the 
room. I cast one look at grannie as he led me away. She 
had thrown her head back on her chair, and her eyes were 
closed; but her face looked ofiended, almost angry. She 
looked to my fancy as if she were trying but unable to lie 
down. My uncle closed the doors very gently. In the mid- 
dle of the stair he stopped, and said in a low voice, 

“ Willie, do you know that when people grow very old, they 
are not quite like other people ?” 

“ Yes. They want to go to the church-yard,” I answered. 

“ They fancy things,” said my uncle. “ Grannie thinks you 
are her own son.” 


AT THE TOP OF THE CHIMNEY-STAIR. 


19 


“ And ain’t I ?” I asked innocently. 

“ Not exactly,” lie answered. “ Your father was her son’s 
son. She forgets^ that, and wants to talk to you as if you 
were your grandfather. Poor old Grannie ! I don’t wish you 
to go and see her without your aunt or me : mind that.” 

Whether I made any promise I do not remember ; but I 
know that a new something was mingled with my life from 
that moment. An air as it were of the tomb mingled hence- 
forth with the homely delights of my life. Grannie wanted 
to die, and uncle would not let her. She longed for her 
grave, and they would keep her above ground. And from 
the feeling that grannie ought to be buried, grew an awfiil 
sense that she was not alive — not alive, that is, as other people 
are alive, and a gulf was fixed between her and me which for 
a long time I never attempted to pass, avoiding as much as I 
could all communication with her, even when my uncle or 
aunt wished to take me to her room. They did not seem dis- 
pleased, however, when I objected, and not always insisted on 
obedience. 

Thus affairs went on in our quiet household for what seemed 
to me a very long time. 


20 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTEK IV. 

THE PENDULUM. 

It may have been a year after this, it may have been two, 
I cannot tell, when the next great event in my life occurred. 
I think it was towards the close of an autumn, but there was 
not so much about our house as elsewhere to mark the 
changes of the seasons, for the grass was always green. I 
remember it was a sultry afternoon. I had been out almost 
the whole day, wandering hither and thither over the grass, 
and I felt hot and oppressed. Not an air was stirring. I 
longed for a breath of wind, for I was not afraid of the wind 
itself, only of the trees that made it. Indeed, I delighted in 
the wind, and would run against it with exuberant pleasure, 
even rejoicing in the fancy that I, as well as the trees, could 
make the wind by shaking my hair about as I ran. I must 
run, however ; whereas the trees, whose prime business it was, 
could do it without stirring from the spot. But this was 
much too hot an afternoon for me, whose mood was always 
more inclined to the passive than the active, to run about 
and toss my hair, even for the sake of the breeze that would 
result therefrom. I bethought myself. I was nearly a man 
now ; I would be afraid of things no more ; I would get out 
my pendulum, and see whether that would not help me. Not 
this time would I flinch from what consequences might follow. 
Let them be what they might, the pendulum should wag, and 
have a fair chance of doing its best. 

I went up to my room, a sense of high emprise filling my 
little heart. Composedly, yea solemnly, I set to work, even as 
some enchanter of old might have drawn his circle, and 
chosen his spell out of his iron-clasped volume. I strode to 
the closet in which the awful instrument dwelt. It stood in 
the farthest corner. As I lifted it, something like a groan 



“I SAT AND WATCHED IT WITH GROWING AWE.” 







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THE PENDULUM. 


21 


invaded my ear. My notions of locality were not then suffi- 
ciently developed to let me know that grannie^s room was on 
the other side of that closet. I almost let the creature, for as 
such I regarded it, drop. I was not to be deterred, however. 
I bore it carefully to the light, and set it gently on the win- 
dow-sill, full in view of the distant trees towards the west. I 
left it then for a moment, as if that it might gather its 
strength for its unwonted labors, while I closed the door, and, 
with what fancy I can scarcely imagine now, the curtains of 
my bed as well. Possibly it was with some notion of having 
one place to which, if the worst came to the worst, I might 
retreat for safety. Again I approached the window, and after 
standing for some time in contemplation of the pendulum, I 
set it in motion, and stood watching it. 

It swung slower and slower. It wanted to stop. It should 
not stop. I gave it another swing. On it went, at first some- 
what distractedly, next more regularly, then with slowly re- 
tarding movement. But it should not stop. 

I turned in haste and got from the side of my bed the only 
chair in the room, placed it in the window, sat down before 
the reluctant instrument and gave it a third swing. Then, 
my elbows on the sill, I sat and watched it with growing awe, 
but growing determination as well. Once more it showed 
signs of refusal ; once more the forefinger of my right hand 
administered impulse. 

Something gave a crack inside the creature : away went the 
pendulum swinging with a will. I sat and gazed, almost hor- 
ror-stricken. Ere many moments had passed, the feeling of 
terror had risen to such a height that, for the very terror, I 
would have seized the pendulum in a frantic grasp I did 
not. On it went, and I sat looking. My dismay was grad- 
ually subsiding. 

I have learned since that a certain ancestor— or was he 
only a great-uncle ? — I forget — had a taste for mechanics, 
even to the craze of perpetual motion, and could work well in 
brass and iron. The creature was probably some invention 
of his. It was a real marvel, how, after so many years of 


22 


WILFRID CUMBEEMEDE, 


idleness, it could now go as it did. I confess, as I contem- 
plate the thing, I am in a puzzle, and almost fancy the whole 
a dream. But let it pass. At worst, something of which this 
is the sole representative residuum, wrought an effect on me 
which embodies its cause thus, as I search for it in the past. 
And why should not the individual life have its misty legends 
as well as that of nations ? From them, as from the golden 
and rosy clouds of morning, dawns at last the true sun of its 
unquestionable history. Every boy has his own fables, just as 
the Romes and the Englands of the world have their Romuli 
and their Arthurs, their suckling wolves and their granite- 
sheathed swords. Do they not reflect each other ? I tell the 
tale as ^tis left in me. 

How long I sat thus gazing at the now self-impelled instru- 
ment, I cannot say. The next point in the progress of the 
legend is a gust of wind rattling the window in whose recess I 
was seated. I jumped from my chair in terror. While I 
had been absorbed in the pendulum, the evening had closed 
in : clouds had gathered over the sky, and all was gloomy 
about the house. It was much too dark to see the distant 
trees, but there could be no doubt they were at work. The 
pendulum had roused them. Another, a third, and a fourth 
gust rattled and shook the rickety frame. I had done it at 
last ! The trees were busy away there in the darkness. I 
and my pendulum could make the wind. 

The gusts came faster aud faster, and grew into blasts 
which settled into a steady gale. The pendulum went on 
swinging to and fro, and the gale went on increasing in vio- 
lence. I sat half in terror, half in delight at the awful success 
of my experiment. I would have opened the window to let 
in the coveted air, hut that was beyond my knowledge and 
strength. I could make the wind blow, but, like other magi- 
cians, I could not share its benefits. I would go out and meet 
it on the open plain. I crept down the stair like a thief— not 
that I feared detention, but that I felt such a sense of the im- 
portant, even the dread, about myself and my instrument, that 
I was not in harmony with souls reflecting only the common 


THE PENDULUM- 


23 


affairs of life. In a moment I was in the middle of the storm — 
for storm it very nearly was and soon became. I rushed to 
and fro in the midst of it, lay down and rolled in it, and 
laughed and shouted as I looked up to the window where the 
pendulum was swinging, and thought of the trees at work 
away in the dark. The wind grew stronger and stronger. What 
if the pendulum should not stop at all, and the wind went on 
and on, growing louder and fiercer, till it grew mad and blew 
away the house ? Ah, then, poor grannie would have a chance 
of being buried at last! Seriously, the affair might grow 
serious. 

Such thoughts were passing in my mind, when all at once 
the wind gave a roar which made me spring to my feet and 
rush for the house. I must stop the pendulum. There was a 
strange sound in that blast. The trees themselves had had 
enough of it, and were protesting against the creature’s 
tyranny. Their master was working them too hard. I ran 
up the stair on all fours ; it was my way when I was in a 
hurry. Swinging went the pendulum in the window, and the 
wind roared in the chimney. I seized hold of the oscillating 
thing, and stopped it ; but to my amaze and consternation, the 
moment I released it, on it went again. I must sit and hold 
it. But the voice of my aunt called me from below, and as 
I dared not explain why I would rather not appear, I was 
forced to obey. I lingered on the stair, half minded to return. 

“ What a rough night it is I ” I heard my aunt say, with 
rare remark. 

“ It gets worse and worse,” responded my uncle. “ I hope 
it won’t disturb grannie ; but the wind must roar fearfully in 
her chimney.” 

I stood like a culprit. What if they should find out that 
I was at the root of the mischief, at the heart of the storm. 

“ If I could believe all I have been reading to-night about 
the Prince of the Power of the Air, I should not like this 
storm at all,” continued my uncle, with a smile. “ But books 
are not always to be trusted because they are old,” he added 
with another smile. “ Prom the glass, I expected rain not wind.” 


24 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Whatever wind there is, we get it all,” said my aunt. 
“ I wonder what Willie is about. I thought I heard him 
coming down. Isn’t it time, David, we did something about 
his schooling ? It won’t do to have him idling about this way 
all day long.” 

“ He’s a mere child,” returned my uncle. “ I’m not forget- 
ting him. But I can’t send him away yet.” 

“ You know best,” returned my aunt. 

Send me away / What could it mean ? Why should I — 
where should I go ? Was not the old place a part of me, just 
like my own clothes on my own body ? This was the kind of 
feeling that woke in me at the words* But hearing my aunt 
push back her chair, evidently with the purpose of finding me, 
I descended into the room. 

“ Come along, Willie,” said my uncle. “ Hear the wind, how 
it roars ! ” 

“ Yes, uncle ; it does roar,” I said, feeling a hypocrite for 
the first time in my life. Knowing far more about the roar- 
ing than he did, I yet spoke like an innocent. 

“ Do you know who makes the wind, WiUie ? 

“ Yes. The trees,” I answered. 

My uncle opened his blue eyes very wide, and looked at my 
aunt. He had no idea what a little heathen I was. The more 
a man has wrought out his own mental condition, the readier 
he is to suppose that children must be able to work out theirs, 
^nd to forget that he did not work out his information, but 
his conclusions. My uncle began to think it was time 
jl^ take me in hand. 

No, Willie,” he said. “ I must teach you better than 
that.” 

I expected him tp begin by telling me that God made the 
wind ; but, whether it was that what the old book said about 
the Prince of the Power of the Air returned upon him, or 
that he thought it an unfitting occasion for such a lesson when 
the wind was roaring so as to render its divine origin ques- 
tionable, he said no more. Bewildered,- 1 &ncy, with ray 
ignorance, he turned after a pause, to my aunt. 


THE PENDULUM. 


25 


“ Don't you thinly it’s time for him to go to bed, Jane ?” he 
suggested. 

My aunt replied by getting from the cupboard my usual 
supper— a basin of milk and a slice of bread ; which I ate 
with less circumspection than usual, for I was eager to return 
to my room. As soon as I had finished, Nannie was called, 
and I bade them good-night. 

“ Make haste, Nannie,” I said. “ Don’t you hear how the 
wind is roaring ? ” 

It was roaring louder than ever, and there was the pendulum 
swinging away in the window. Nannie took no notice of it, 
and, I presume, only thought I wanted to get my head under 
the bed-clothes, and so escape the sound of it. Anyhow, she 
did make haste, and in a very few minutes I was, as she sup- 
posed, snugly settled for the night. But the moment she shut 
the door I was out of bed and at the window. The instant 
I reached it, a great dash of rain swept against the panes, and 
the wind howled more fiercely than ever. Believing I had 
the key of the position, inasmuch as, if I pleased, I could take 
the pendulum to bed with me, and stifle its motions with the 
bed-clothes — for this happy idea had dawned upon me while 
Nannie was undressing me — I was composed enough now to 
press my face to a pane and look out. There was a small 
space amid the storm dimly illuminated from the windows 
below, and the moment I looked — out of the darkness 
into this dim space, as if blown thither by the wind, 
rushed a figure on horseback, his large cloak flying out before 
him and the mane of the animal he rode streaming out over 
his ears in the fiefceness of the blast. He pulled up right 
under my window, and I thought he looked up, and made 
threatening gestures at me ; but I believe now that horse and 
man pulled up in sudden danger of dashing against the wall of 
the house. I shrank back, and when I peeped out again 
he was gone. The same moment the pendulum gave a click 
and stopped ; one more rattle of rain against' the windows, and 
then the wind stopped also. I crept back to my bed in a new 
terror, for might not this be the Prince of the Power of the 


26 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Air, come to see who was meddling with his affairs ? Had he 
not come right out of the storm, and straight from the trees ? He 
must have something to do with it all ! Before I had settled 
the probabilities of the question, however, I was fast asleep. 

I awoke — how long after, I cannot tell — with the sound of 
voices in my ears. It was still dark. The voices came from 
below. I had been dreaming of the strange horseman, who 
had turned out to be the awful being concerning whom Nan- 
nie had enlightened me as going about at night, to buy little 
children from their nurses, and make bagpipes of their skins. 
Awaked from such a dream, it was impossible to lie still with- 
out knowing what those voices down below were talking 
about. The strange one must belong to the being, whatever 
he was, whom I had seen come out of the storm ; and of 
whom could they be talking but me ? I was right in both 
conclusions. 

With a fearful resolution, I slipped out of bed, opened the 
door as noiselessly as I might, and crept on my bare, silent 
feet down the creaking stair, which led, with open balustrade, 
right into the kitchen, at the end farthest from the chimney. 
The one candle at the other end could not illuminate its dark- 
ness, and I sat unseen, a few steps from the bottom of the 
stair, listening with all my ears and staring with all my eyes. 
The stranger’s huge cloak hung drying before the fire, and he 
was drinking something out of a tumbler. The light fell full 
upon his face. It was a curious, and certainly not to me an 
attractive face. The forehead was very projecting, and the 
eyes were very small, deep set, and sparkling. The mouth — 
I had almost said muzzle — was very projecting likewise, and 
the lower jaw shot in front of the upper. When the man 
smiled the light was reflecting from what seemed to my eyes 
an inordinate multitude of white teeth. His ears were narrow 
and long, and set very high upon his head. The hand, which 
he every now and then displayed in the exigencies of his 
persuasion, was white, but very large, and the thumb was 
exceedingly long. I had weighty reasons for both suspecting 
and fearing the man ; and, leaving my prejudices out of the 


THE PENDULUM. 


27 


question, there was in the conversation itself enough besides 
to make me take note of dangerous points in his appearance. 
I never could lay much claim to physical courage, and I 
attribute my behaviour on this occasion rather to the fascina- 
tion of the terror than to any impulse of self-preservation ; 
I sat there in utter silence, listening like an ear-trumpet. The 
first words I could distinguish were to this effect : — 

“You do not mean,” said the enemy, “to tell me, Mr. 
Cumbermede, that you intend to bring up the young fellow in 
absolute ignorance of the decrees of fate ?” 

“ I pledge myself to nothing in the matter,” returned my 
uncle, calmly, but with a something in his tone which was 
new to me. 

“ Good heavens !” exclaimed the other. “ Excuse me, sir, 
but what right can you have to interfere after such a serious 
fashion with the young gentleman’s future ?” 

“ It seems to me,” said my uncle, “ that you wish to inter- 
fere with it after a much more serious fashion. There are 
things in which ignorance may be preferable to knowledge.” 

“ But what harm could the knowledge of such a fact do 
him T* 

“ Upset all his notions, render him incapable of thinking 
about anything of importance, occasion an utter ” 

“ But can anything be more important ?” interrupted the 
visitor. 

My uncle went on without heeding him. 

“ Plunge him over head and ears in ” 

“ Hot water, I grant you,” again interrupted the enemy, to 
my horror ; “ but it wouldn’t be for long. Only give me your 
sanction, and I promise you to have the case as tight as a 
drum before I ask you to move a step in it.” 

“ But why should you take so much interest in what is 
purely our affair ?” asked my uncle. 

“ Why, of course, you would have to pay the piper,” said 
the man. 

This was too much ! Pay the man that played upon me 
after I was made into bagpipes ! The idea was too frightful 


28 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


must look out for business, you know; and, by Jove! I 
shall never have such a chance, if I live to the age of Me- 
thuselah.” 

“ Well, you shall not have it from me.” 

“Then,” said the man, rising, “you are more of a fool than 
I took you for.” 

“ Sir 1” said my uncle. 

“No offence; no offence, I assure you. But it is provoking 
to find people so blind — so wilfully blind — to their own inter- 
est. You may say I have nothing to lose. Give me the boy, 
and I’ll bring him up like my own son ; send him to school 
and college, too — all on the chance of being repaid twice over 
by ” 

I knew this was all a trick to get hold of my skin. The 
man said it on his way to the door, his ape-face shining dim 
as he turned it a little back in the direction of my uncle, who 
followed with the candle. I lost the last part of the sentence 
in the terror which sent me bounding up the stair in my usual 
four-footed fashion. I leaped into my bed, shaking with cold 
and agony combined. But I had the satisfaction presently of 
hearing the thud of the horse’s hoofs upon the sward, dying 
away in the direction whence they had come. Affer that I 
soon fell asleep. 

I need hardly say that I never set the pendulum swinging 
again. Many years after, I came upon it when searching for 
papers, and the thrill which vibrated through my whole 
frame, announced a strange and unwelcome presence long 
before my memory could recall its origin. 

It must not be supposed that I pretend to remember all 
the conversation I have just set down. The words are but the 
forms in which, enlightened by facts which have since come to 
my knowledge, I clothe certain vague memories and impres- 
sions of such an interview as certainly took place. 

In the morning at breakfast, my aunt asked my uncle who 
it was that paid such an untimely visit the preceding night. 

“ A fellow from C ” (the county town), “ an attorney 

— what did he say his name was? Yes, I remember. It 


THE PENDULUM. 29 

was the same as the steward’s over the way. Coningham, it 
was.” 

“Mr. Coningham has a son there — an attorney too, I 
think,” said my aunt. 

My uncle seemed struck by the reminder, and became medi- 
tative. 

“ That explains his choosing sUch a night to come in. His 
father is getting an old man now. Yes, it must be the same.” 

“ He’s a sharp one, folk say,” said my aunt, with a pointed- 
ness in the remark which showed some anxiety. 

“ That he cannot conceal, sharp as he is,” said my uncle, 
and there the conversation stopped. 

The very next evening my imcle began to teach me. I had 
a vague notion that this had something to do with my protec- 
tion against the machinations of the man Coningham, the idea 
of whom was inextricably associated in my mind with that of 
the Prince of the Power of the Air, darting from the midst of 
the churning trees, on a horse whose streaming mane and 
flashing eyes indicated no true equine origin. I gave myself 
with diligence to the work my uncle set me. 


80 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER V. 

I HAVE LESSONS. 

It is a simple fact that up to this time I did not know my 
letters. It was, I believe, part of my uncle’s theory of educa- 
tion, that as little pain as possible should be associated with 
merely intellectual effort : he would not allow me, therefore, 
to commence my studies until the task of learning should be 
an easy one. Henceforth, every evening, after tea, he took 
me to his own room, the walls of which were nearly covered 
with books, and there taught me. 

One peculiar instance of his mode I will give, and let it 
stand rather as a pledge for the rest of his system than an in- 
dex to it. It was only the other day it came back to me. 
Like Jean Paul, he would utter the name of God to a child 
only at grand moments ; but there was a, great difference in 
the moments the two men would have chosen. Jean Paul 
would choose a thunder-storm, for instance ; the following will 
show the kind of my uncle’s choice. One Sunday evening he 
took me for a longer walk than usual. We had climbed a 
little hill : I believe it was the first time I ever had a wide 
view of the earth. The horses were all loose in the fields ; 
the cattle were gathering their supper as the sun went down ; 
there was an indescribable hush in the air, as if Nature her- 
self knew the seventh day ; there was no sound even of water, 
for here the water crept slowly to the far-off sea, and the slant 
sunlight shone back from just one bend of a canal-like river ; 
the haystacks and ricks of the last year gleamed golden in the 
farm-yards ; great fields of wheat stood up stately around us, 
the glow in their yellow brought out by the red poppies that 
sheltered in the forest of their stems ; the odor of the grass 
and clover came in pulses; and the soft blue sky was flecked 
with white clouds tinged with pink, which deepened until it 


I HAVE LESSONS. 


Zl 


gathered into a flaming rose in the west, where the sun was 
welling out oceans of liquid red. 

I looked up in my uncle’s face. It shone in a calm glow, 
like an answering, rosy moon. The eyes of my mind were 
opened : I saw that he felt something, and then I felt it too. 
His soul, with the glory for an interpreter, kindled mine. 
He, in turn, caught the sight of my face, and his soul broke 
forth in one word : — 

“God! Willie; God!” was all he said; and surely it was 
enough. 

It was only then, in moments of strong repose, that my 
uncle spoke to me of God. 

Although he never petted me, that is, never showed me any 
animal affection, my uncle was like a father to me in this, that 
he was about and above me, a pure benevolence. It is nc 
wonder that I should learn rapidly under his teaching, for 1 
was quick enough, and possessed the more energy that it had 
not been wasted on unpleasant tasks. 

Whether from indifference or intent I cannot tell, but he 
never forbade me to touch any of his books. Upon more 
occasions than one he found me on the floor with a folio 
between my knees ; but he only smiled and said — 

“ Ah, Willie ! mind you don’t crumple the leaves.” 

About this time also I had a new experience of another 
kind, which impressed me almost with the force of a re- 
velation. 

I had not yet explored the boundaries of the prairie-like 
level on which I found myself. As soon as I got about a 
certain distance from home, I always turned and ran back. 
Fear is sometimes the first recognition of freedom. Delight- 
ing in liberty, I yet shrunk from the unknown spaces around 
me, and rushed back to the shelter of the home-walls. But 
as I grew older I became more adventurous ; and one evening, 
although the shadows were beginning to lengthen, I went on 
and on until I made a discovery. I found a half-spherical 
hollow in the grassy surface. I rushed into its depth as if it 
had been a mine of marvels, threw myself on the ground, and 


32 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE, 


gazed into the sky as if I had now for the first time discov 
ered its true relation to the earth. The earth was a cup, and 
the sky its cover. 

There were lovely daisies in this hollow — not too many to 
spoil the grass, and they were red-tipped daisies. There was 
besides, in the very heart of it, one plant of the finest pim- 
pernels I have ever seen, and this was my introduction to the 
flower. Nor were these all the treasures of the spot. A late 
primrose, a tiny child, born out of due time, opened its timid 
petals in the same hollow. Here then were gathered red- 
tipped daisies, large pimpernels, and one tiny primrose. I lay 
and looked at them in delight — not at all inclined to pull 
them, for they were where I loved to see them. I never had 
much inclination to gather flowers. I see them as a part of a 
whole, and rejoice in them in their own place without any 
desire to appropriate them. I lay and looked at these for a 
long time. Perhaps I fell asleep. I do not know. I have 
often waked in the open air. All at once I looked up and 
saw a vision. 

My reader will please to remember that up to this hour I 
had never seen a lady. I cannot by any stretch call my 
worthy aunt a lady ; and my grandmother was too old, and 
too much an object of mysterious anxiety, to produce the 
impression of a lady upon me. Suddenly I became aware 
that a lady was looking down on me. Over the edge of my 
horizon, the circle of the hollow that touched the sky, her 
face shone like a rising moon. Sweet eyes looked on me, and 
a sweet mouth was tremulous with a smile. I will not 
attempt to describe her. To my childish eyes she was much 
what a descended angel must have been to eyes of old, in the 
days when angels did descend, and there were Arabs or Jews 
on the earth who could see them. A new knowledge dawned 
in me. I lay motionless, looking up with worship in my 
heart. As suddenly she vanished. I lay far into the 
twilight, and then rose and went home, half bewildered, with 
a sense of heaven about me which settled into the fancy that 
my mother had come to see me. I wondered afterwards that 


I HAVE LESSONS. 


33 


I had not followed her ; but I never forgot her, and, morning, 
mid-day, or evening, whenever the fit seized me, I would 
wander away and lie down in the hollow, gazing at the spot 
where the lovely face had arisen, in the fancy, hardly in the 
hope, that my moon might once more arise and bless me with 
her vision. 

Hence I suppose came another habit of mine, that of 
watching in the same hollow, and in the same posture, now for 
the sun, now for the moon, but generally for the sun. You 
might have taken me for a fire-worshipper, so eagerly would I 
rise, when the desire came upon me, so hastily in the clear 
gray of the morning, would I dress myself, lest the sun should 
be up before me, and I fail to catch his first lance-like rays 
dazzling through the forest of grass on the edge of my hollow 
world. Bare-footed I would scud like a hare through the 
dew, heedless of the sweet air of the morning, heedless of the 
few bird-songs about me, heedless even of the east, whose 
safiron might just be burning into gold, as I ran to gain the 
green hollow whence alone I would greet the morning. 
Arrived there, I shot into its shelter, and threw myself 
panting on the grass, to gaze on the spot at which I expected 
the rising glory to appear. Ever when I recall the custom, 
that one lark is wildly praising over my head, for he sees the 
sun for which I am waiting. He has his nest in the hollow 
beside me. I would sooner have turned my back on the sun 
than disturbed the home of his high-priest, the lark. And 
now the edge of my horizon begins to burn ; the green blades 
glow in their tops ; they are melted through with light ; the 
fiashes invade my eyes ; they gather ; they grow, until I hide 
my face in my hands. The sun is up. But on ray hands and 
my knees I rush after the retreating shadow, and, like a child 
at play with its nurse, hide in its curtain. Up and up comes 
the peering sun ; he will find me ; I cannot hide from him ; 
there is in the wide field no shelter from his gaze. No matter 
then. Let him shine into the deepest corners of my heart, 
and shake the cowardice and the meanness out of it. 

I thus made friends with Nature. I had no great variety 
3 


34 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


even in her, but the better did I understand what I had. The 
next summer, I began to hunt for glow-worms, and carry them 
carefully to my hollow, that in the warm, soft, moonless 
nights they might illumine it with a strange light. When I 
had been very successful, I would call my uncle and aunt to 
see. My aunt tried me by always having something to do 
fii'st. My uncle, on the other hand, would lay down his book 
at once, and follow me submissively. He could not generate 
amusement for me, but he sympathized with what I could find 
for myself. 

“ Come and see my cows,” I would say to him. 

I well remember the first time I took him to see them. 
When we reached the hollow, he stood for a moment silent. 
Then he said, laying his hand on my shoulder, 

“Very pretty, Willie! But why do you call them cows?” 

“ You told me last night,” I answered, “ that the road the 
angels go across the sky is called the milky way — didn’t you, 
uncle ? ” 

“ I never told you the angels went that way, my boy.” 

“ Oh 1 didn’t you ? I thought you did.” 

“No, I didn’t.” 

“ Oh ! I remember now : I thought if it was a way, and 
nobody but the angels could go in it, that must be the way 
the angels did go.” 

“ Yes, yes, I see I But what has that to do with glow-worms ?” 

“ Don’t you see, uncle ? If it be the milky way, the stars 
must be the cows. Look at my cows, uijcle. Their milk is 
very pretty milk, isn’t it ? ” 

“Very pretty, indeed, my dear — rather green.” 

“ Then I suppose if you could put it in auntie’s pan, you 
might make another moon of it ? ” 

“ That’s being silly now,” said my uncle ; and I ceased, 
abashed. 

“ Look, look, uncle 1 ” I exclaimed, a moment after ; 
“ they don’t like being talked about, my cows.” 

For as if a cold gust of wind had passed over them, they 
all dwindled and paled. I thought they were going out. 


1 HAVE LESSONS. 


35 


“ Oh, dear, oh, dear ! ” I cried, and began dancing about 
with dismay. The next instant the glow returned, and the 
hollow was radiant. 

“ Oh the dear light ! ” I cried again. “ Look at it, uncle ! 
Isn’t it lovely ? ” 

He took me by the hand. His actions were always so 
much more tender than his words ! 

“ Do you know who is the light of the world, Willie ? ” 

“ Yes, well enough. I saw him get out of bed this 
morning.” 

My uncle led me home without a word more. But next 
night he began to teach me about the light of the world, and 
about walking in the light. I do not care to repeat much of 
what he taught me in this kind, for, like my glow-worms, it 
does not like to be talked about. Somehow it loses color and 
shine when one talks. 

I have now shown sufficiently how my uncle would seize 
opportunities for beginning things. He thought more of the 
beginning than of any other part of a process. 

“All’s well that begins well,” he would say. I did not 
know what his smile meant as he said so. 

I sometimes wonder how I managed to get through the days 
without being weary. No one ever thought of giving me toys. 
I had a turn for using my hands ; but I was too young to be 
trusted with a knife. I had never seen a kite, except far away 
in the sky: I took it for a bird. There were no rushes to 
make water-wheels o^ and no brooks to set them turning in. 
I had neither top nor marbles. I had no dog to play with. 
And yet I do not remember once feeling weary. I knew all 
the creatures that went creeping about in the grass, and al- 
though I did not know the proper name for one of them, I had 
names of my own for them all, and was so familiar with their 
looks and their habits, that I am confident I could in some de- 
gree interpret some of the people I met afterwards by their re- 
semblances to these insects. I have a man in my mind now 
who has exactly the head and face, if face it can be called, of 
an ant. It is not a head, but a helmet. I knew all the but- 


36 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


terflies — they were mostly small ones, but of lovely varieties. 
A stray dragon-fly would now and then delight me ; and there 
were hunting-spiders and wood-lice, and queerer creatures of 
which I do not yet know the names. Then there were grass- 
hoppers, which for some time I took to be made of green leaves, 
and I thought they grew like fruit on the trees till they were 
ripe, when they jumped down, and jumped for ever after. 
Another child might have caught and caged them ; for me, I 
followed them about, and watched their ways. 

In the winter things had not hitherto gone quite so well 
with me. Then I had been a good deal dependent upon Nan- 
nie and her stories, which were neither very varied nor very 
well told. But now that I had begun to read, things went 
better. To be sure, there were not in my undoes library many 
books such as children have nowadays, but there were old his- 
tories, and some voyages and travels, and in them I revelled. 
I am perplexed sometimes when I look into one of these books 
— for I have them all about me now — ^to find how dry they 
are. The shine seems to have gone out of them. Or is it that 
the shine has gone out of the eyes that used to read them ? If 
so, it will come again some day. I do not find that the shine 
has gone out of a beetle’s back ; and I can read The Pilgrim' i 
Progress still. 


I COBBLE. 


37 


CHAPTER VL 

I COBBLE. 

All this has led me, after a roundabout fashion, to what 
became for some time the chief delight of my winters — an em- 
ployment, moreover, which I have taken up afresh at odd 
times during my life. It came about thus. My uncle had 
made me a present of an old book with pictures in it. It was 
called The Preceptor — one of Dodsley’s publications. There 
were wonderful folding plates of all sorts in it. Those which 
represented animals were of course my favorites. But these 
especially were in a very dilapidated condition, for there had 
been children before me somewhere ; and I proceeded, at my 
uncle’s suggestion, to try to mend them by pasting them on an- 
other piece of paper. I made bad work of it at first, and was 
so dissatisfied with the results, that I set myself in earnest to 
find out by what laws of paste and paper success might be se- 
cured Before the winter was over, my uncle found me grown 
so skillful m this manipulation of broken leaves — for as yet I 
had not ventured further in any of the branches of repair — 
that he gave me plenty of little jobs of the sort, for amongst 
his books there were many old ones. This was a source of 
great pleasure Before the following winter was over, I came 
to try my hand at repairing bindings, and my uncle was again 
so much pleased with my success, that one day he brought me 
from the county town some sheets of parchment with which to 
attempt the fortification of certain vellum-bound volumes 
which were considerably the worse for age and use. I well 
remember how troublesome the parchment was for a long 
time ; but at last I conquered it, and succeeded very fairly in 
my endeavors to restore to tidiness the garments of ancient 
thought. 

But there was another consequence of this pursuit which 


38 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


may be considered of weight in my history. This was the dis- 
covery of a copy of the Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia — much 
in want of skillful patching, from the title-page, with its boar 
smelling at the rose-bush, to the graduated lines and the Finis. 
This book I read through from boar to finis — no small under- 
taking, and partly, no doubt, under its influences, I became 
about this time conscious of a desire after honor, as yet a no- 
tion of the vaguest. I hardly know how I escaped the taking 
for granted that there were yet knights riding about on war- 
horses, with couched lances and fierce spurs, everywhere, as in 
the days of old. They might have been roaming the world in 
all directions, without my seeing -one of them. But somehow 
I did not fall into the mistake. Only with the thought of my 
future career, when I should be a man and go out into the 
world, came always the thought of the sword that hung on 
the wall. A longing to handle it began to possess me, and 
my old dream returned. I dared not, however, say a word to 
my uncle on the subject. I felt certain that he would slight 
the desire, and perhaps tell me I should hurt myself with the 
weapon ; and one whose heart glowed at the story of the bat- 
tle between him on the white horse with carnation mane and 
tail, in his armor of blue radiated with gold, and him on the 
black spotted brown, in his dusky armor of despair, could not 
expose himself to such an indignity. 


THE SWORD ON THE WALL. 


89 


CHAPTER VII. 

THE SWORD ON THE WALL. 

Where possession was impossible, knowledge might yet be 
reached ; could I not learn the story of the ancient weapon ? 
How came that which had more fitly hung in the hall of a 
great castle, here upon the wall of a kitchen ? My uncle, 
however, I felt, was not the source whence I might hope for 
help. No better was my aunt. Indeed I had the conviction 
that slie neither knew nor cared anything about the useless 
thing. It was her tea-table that must be kept bright for 
honor’s sake. But there was grannie ! 

My relations with her had continued much the same. The 
old fear of her lingered, and as yet I had had no inclination 
to visit her room by myself. I saw that my uncle and aunt 
always behaved to her with the greatest kindness and much 
deference, but could not help observing also that she cherished 
some secret ofience, receiving their ministrations with a cer- 
tain condescension which clearly enough manifested its origin 
as hidden cause of complaint and not pride. I wondered that 
my uncle and aunt took no notice of it, always addressing her 
as if they were on the best possible terms ; and I knew that 
my uncle never went to his work without visiting her, and 
never went to bed without reading a prayer by her bedside 
first. I think Nannie told me this. 

She could still read a little, for her sight had been short, 
and had held out better even than usual with such. But she 
cared nothing for the news of the hour. My uncle had a 
weekly newspaper, though not by any means regularly, from a 
friend in London, but I never saw it in my grandmother’s 
hands. Her reading was mostly in the Spectator^ or in one of 
He Foe’s works. I have seen her reading Pope. 


40 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


The sword was in my bones, and as I judged that only from 
grannie could I get any information respecting it, I found 
myself beginning to inquire why I was afraid to go to her. I 
was unable to account for it, still less to justify it. As I re- 
flected, the kindness of her words and expression dawned 
upon me, and I even got so far as to believe that I had been 
guilty of neglect in not visiting her oftener and doing some- 
thing for her. True, I recalled likewise that my uncle had 
desired me not to visit her except with him or my aunt, but 
that was ages ago, when I was a very little boy, and might 
have been troublesome. I could even read to her now if she 
wished it. In short, I felt myself perfectly capable of enter- 
ing into social relations with her generally. But if there was 
any flow of affection towards her, it was the sword that had 
broken the seal of its fountain. 

One morning at breakfast I had been sitting gazing at the 
sword on the wall opposite me. My aunt had observed the 
steadiness of my look. 

“What are you staring at, Willie?” she said. “Your eyes 
are fixed in your head. Are you choking ?” 

The words offended me. I got up and walked out of the 
room. As I went round the table I saw that my uncle and 
aunt were staring at each other very much as I had been star- 
ing at the sword. I soon felt ashamed of myself, and re- 
turned, hoping that my behaviour might be attributed to some 
passing indisposition. Mechanically I raised my eyes to the 
wall. Could I believe them? The sword was gone — abso- 
lutely gone ! My heart seemed to swell up into my throat ; I 
felt my cheeks burning. The passion grew within me, and 
might have broken out in some form or other, had I not felt 
that would at once betray my secret. I sat still with a fierce 
effort, consoling and strengthening myself with the resolution 
that I would hesitate no longer, but take the first chance of a 
private interview with grannie. I tried hard to look as if 
nothing had happened, and when breakfast was over, went to 
my own room. It was there I carried on my pasting opera- 
tions. There also at this time I drank deep in the Pilgrim^ s 


THE SWORD ON THE WALL. 


41 


Progress: there were swords, and armor, and giants, and 
demons there ; but I had no inclination for either employment 
now. 

My uncle left for the farm as usual, and to my delight I 
s jon discovered that my aunt had gone with him. The ways 
of the house were as regular as those of a bee-hive. Sitting in 
my own room I knew precisely where any one must be at any 
given moment; for although the only clock we had was 
oftener standing than going, a perfect instinct of time was 
common to the household, Nannie included. At that moment 
she was sweeping up the hearth and putting on the kettle. 
In half an hour she would have tidied up the kitchen, and 
would have gone to prepare the vegetables for cooking : I 
must wait. But the sudden fear struck me that my aunt 
might have taken the sword with her — might be going to 
make away with it altogether. I started up and rushed 
about the room in an agony. What could I do ? At length 
I heard Nannie’s pattens clatter out of the kitchen to a small 
out-house where she pared the potatoes. I instantly de- 
scended, crossed the kitchen, and went up the winding stone 
stair. I opened grannie’s door, and went in. 

She was seated in her usual place. Never till now had I 
felt how old she was. She looked up when I entered, for 
although she had grown very deaf, she could feel the floor 
shake. I saw by her eyes which looked higher than my head, 
that she had expected a taller figure to follow me. When I 
turned from shutting the door, I saw her arms extended with 
an eager look, and could see her hands trembling ere she 
folded them about me, and pressed my head to her bosom. 

“ O Lord !” she said, “ I thank thee. I will try to be good 
now. O Lord, I have waited, and thou hast heard me. I 
will believe in thee again !” 

For that moment I loved my grannie, and felt that I owed 
her something as well as my uncle. I had never had this feel- 
ing about my aunt. 

“ Grannie 1” I said, trembling from a conflict of emotions ; 
but before I could utter my complaint, I had burst out crying. 


42 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ What have they been doing to you, child she asked, 
almost fiercely, and sat up straight in her chair. Her voice, 
although feeble and quavering, was determined in tone. She 
pushed me back from her and sought the face I was ashamed 
to show. “ What have they done to you, my boy ?” she re- 
peated, ere I could conquer my sobs sufficiently to speak. 

“ They have taken away the sword that ” 

What sword ?” she asked, quickly. “ Not the sword that 
your great-grandfather wore when he followed Sir Marmaduke?’ 

“ I don’t know, grannie.” 

“Don’t know, boy? The only thing your father took 

when he . Not the sword with the broken sheath? 

Never ! They daren’t do it ! I will go down myself. I must 
see about it at once.” 

“ O grannie, don’t !” I cried in terror, as she rose from her 
chair. “They’ll not let me ever come near you again, if 
you do.” 

She sat down again. After seeming to ponder for a while 
in silence, she said : — 

“Well, Willie, my dear, you’re more to me than the old 
sword. But I wouldn’t have had it handled with disrespect 
for all that the place is worth. However, I don’t suppose they 

can . What made them do it, child ? They’ve not taken 

it down from the wall.” 

“Yes, grannie. I think it was because I was staring at it 
too much, grannie. Perhaps they were afraid I would take it 
down and hurt myself with it. But I was only going to ask 
you about it, grannie.” 

All my notion was some story, I did not think whether true 
or false, like one of Nannie’s stories. 

“ That I will, my child — all about it — all about it. Let me 
see.” 

Her eyes went wandering a little and she looked perplexed. 

“ And they took it from you, did they, then ? Poor child ! 
Poor child !” 

“ They didn’t take it from me, grannie. I never had it in 
my hands.” 


THE SWORD ON THE WALL. 


43 


“ Wouldn’t give it to you then ? Oh dear ! Oh dear !” 

I began to feel uncomfortable — ^grannie looked so strange 
and lost. The old feeling that she ought to be buried because 
she was dead returned upon me ; but I overcame it so far as 
to be able to say : 

“Won’t you tell me about it, then, grannie? I want so 
much to hear about the battle.” 

“What battle, child? Oh yes! I’ll tell you all about it 
some day, but I’ve forgot now, I’ve forgot it all now.” 

She pressed her hand to her forehead, and sat thus for some 
time, while I grew very frightened. I would gladly have left 
the room and crept down stairs, but I stood fascinated, gazing 
at the withered face, half-hidden by the withered hand. I 
longed to be anywhere else, but my will had deserted me, and 
there I must remain. At length grannie took her hand from 
her eyes, and, seeing me, started. 

“Ah, my dear!” she said, “I had forgotten you. You 
wanted me to do something for you: what was it?” 

“ I wanted you to tell me about the sword, grannie.” 

“ Oh yes ! the sword !” she returned, putting her hand again 
to her forehead. “They took it away from you, did they? 
Well, never mind. I will give you something else — though I 
don’t say it’s as good as the sword.” 

She rose, and taking an ivory-headed stick which leaned 
against the side of the chimney-piece, walked with tottering 
steps towards the bureau. There she took from her pocket a 
small bunch of keys, and having, with some difficulty, from the 
trembling of her hands, chosen one, and unlocked the sloping 
cover, she opened a little drawer inside, and took out a gold 
watch, with a bunch of seals hanging from it. Never shall I 
forget the thrill that went through my frame. Did she mean 
to let me hold it in my own hand ? Might I have it as often 
as I came to see her ? Imagine my ecstasy when she put it 
carefully in the two hands I held up to receive it, and said: 

“There, my dear ! You must take good care of it, and never 
give it away for love or money. Don’t you open it — there’s a 
good boy, till your’e a man, like your father. He was a manl 


44 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


He gave it to me the day we were married, for he had nothing 
else, he said, to offer me. But I would not take it, my dear. 
I liked better to see him with it than have it myself. And 
when he left me, I kept it for you. But you must take care 
of it, you know.’’ 

“ Oh, thank you, grannie !” I cried, in an agony of pleasure. 
“ I will take care of it — indeed I will. Is it a real watch, 
grannie — as real as uncle’s ?” 

“It’s worth ten of your uncle’s, my dear. Don’t you show 
it him, though. He might take that away, too. Your uncle’s 
a very good man, my dear ; but you mustn’t mind every thing 
he says to you. He forgets things. I never forget any thing. 
I have plenty of time to think about things. I never forget.” 

“ Will it go, grannie ?” I asked, for my uncle was a much 
less interesting subject than the watch. 

“ It won’t go without being wound up ; but you might break 
it. Besides, it may want cleaning. It’s several years since it 
was cleaned last. Where will you put it now ?” 

“ Oh ! I know where to hide it safe enough, grannie,” I ex- 
claimed. “I’ll take care of it. You needn’t be afraid, 
grannie.” 

The old lady turned, and with difficulty tottered to her seat. 
I remained where I was, fixed in contemplation of my treasure. 
She called me. I went and stood by her knee. 

“ My child, there is something I want very much to tell you, 
but you know old people forget things ” 

“ But you said just now that you never forgot any thing, 
grannie.” 

“No more I do, my dear; only I can’t always lay my hands 
upon a thing when I want it.” 

“ It was about the sword, grannie,” I said, thinking to refresh 
her memory. 

“No, my dear; I don’t think it was about the sword ex- 
actly — though that had something to do with it. I shall re- 
member it all by and by. It will come again. And so must 
you, my dear. Don’t leave your old mother so long alone. 
It’s weary, weary work, waiting.” 


THE SWOKD ON THE WALL. 


45 


“ Indeed I won’t, grannie,” I said. “ I will come the very 
first time I can. Only I mustn’t let auntie see me, you 
know. You don’t want to be buried now, do you, grannie?” I 
added ; for I had begun to love her, and the love had cast out 
the fear, and I did not want her to wish to be buried. 

“ I am very, very old ; much too old to live, my dear. But 
I must do you justice before I can go to my grave. Now I 
know what I wanted to say. It’s gone again. Oh dear! 
Oh dear ! If I had you in the middle of the night, when 
every thing comes back as if it had been only yesterday, I could 
tell you all about it from beginning to end, with all the ins and 
outs of it. But I can’t now — I can’t now.” 

She moaned and rocked herself to and fro. 

“ Never mind, grannie,” I said cheerfully, for I was happy 
tnough for all eternity with my gold watch ; “ I will come and 
fiee you again as soon as ever I can.” And I kissed her on the 
white cheek. 

“ Thank you, my dear. I think you had better go now. 
They may miss you, and then I should never see you again — 
to talk to, I mean.” 

“ Why won’t they let me come and see you, grannie ?” 

“ That’s what I wanted to tell you, if I could only see a little 
better,” she answered, once more putting her hand to her fore- 
head. Perhaps I shall be able to tell you next time. Go 
now, my dear.” 

I left the room, nothing loth, for I longed to be alone with 
my treasure. I could not get enough of it in grannie’s pre- 
sence even. Noiseless as a cat I crept down the stair. When I 
reached the door at the foot, I stood and listened. The kitchen 
was quite silent. I stepped out. There was no one there. 
I scudded across and up the other stair to my own room, care- 
fully shutting the door behind me. Then I sat down on the 
floor, on the other side of the bed, so that it was between me 
and the door, and I could run into the closet with my treasure 
before any one entering should see me. 

The watch was a very thick round one. The back of it was 
crowded vith raised figures in the kind of work called 


46 


WILFBID CUMBERMEDE. 


repouseee, I pored over these for a long time, and then turned 
to the face. It was set all round with shining stones — dia- 
monds, though 1 knew nothing of diamonds then. The enamel 
was cracked, and I followed every crack, as well as every figure 
of the hours. Then I began to wonder what I could do with 
it next. I was not satisfied. Possession, I found, was not 
bliss : it had not rendered me content. But it was as yet im- 
perfect : I had not seen the inside. Grannie had told me not 
to open it : I began to think it hard that I should be denied 
thorough possession of what had been given to me. I believed 
I should be quite satisfied, if I once saw what made it go. I 
turned it over and over, thinking I might at least find how it 
was opened. I have little doubt, if I had discovered the secret 
of it, my virtue would have failed me. All I did find, how- 
ever, was the head of a curious animal engraved on the handle. 
This was something. I examined it as carefully as the rest, 
and then finding I had for the time exhausted the pleasures of 
the watch, I turned to the seals. On one of them was engraved 
what looked like letters, but I could not read them. I did not 
know that they were turned the wrong way. One of them was 
like a W. On the other seal — there were but two, and a cu- 
riously-contrived key — I found the same head as was engraved 
on the handle, — turned the other way, of course. Wearied at 
length, I took the precious thing into the dark closet, and laid 
it in a little box which formed one of my few possessions. I 
then wandered out into the field, and went straying about un- 
til dinner-time, during which I believe I never once lifted my 
eyes to the place where the sword had hung, lest even that 
action should betray the watch. 

From that day, my head, and as much of my heart as might 
be, were filled with the watch. And, alas ! I soon found that 
my book-mending had grown distasteful to me, and for the 
satisfaction of employment, possession was a poor substitute. 
As often as I made the attempt to resume it, I got weary, and 
wandered almost involuntarily to the closet to feel for my trea- 
sure in the dark, handle it once more, and bring it out into the 
light. Already I began to dree the doom of riches, in the vain 


THE SWORD ON THE WALL. 


47 


attempt to live by that which was not bread. Nor was this 
all. A certain weight began to gather over my spirit — a sense 
almost of wrong. For although the watch had been given me 
by my grandmother, and I never doubted either her right to 
dispose of it, or my right to possess it, I could not look my 
uncle in the face, partly from a vague fear lest he should read 
my secret in my eyes, partly from a sense of something out of 
joint between him and me. I began to fancy, and I believe I 
was right, that he looked at me sometimes with a wistfulness 
I had never seen in his face before. This made me so uncom- 
fortable, that I began to avoid his presence as much as possi- 
ble. And although I tried to please him with my lessons, I 
could not learn them as hitherto. 

One day he asked me to bring him the book I had been 
repairing. 

“ It’s not finished yet, uncle,” I said. 

“ Will you bring it me just as it is ? I want to look for 
something in it.” 

I went and brought it with shame. He took it, and having 
found the passage he wanted, turned the volume once over in 
his hands, and gave it me back without a word. 

Next day I restored it to him finished and tidy. He 
thanked me, looked it over again, and put it in its place. 
But I fairly encountered an inquiring and somewhat anxious 
gaze. I believe he had a talk with my aunt about me that 
night. 

The next morning, I was seated by the bedside, with my 
secret in my hand, when I thought I heard the sound of the 
door-handle, and glided at once into the closet. When I 
came out in a flutter of anxiety, there was no one there. But 
I had been too much startled to return to what I had grown 
to feel almost a guilty pleasure. 

The next morning after breakfast, I crept into the closet, 
put my hand unerringly into the one corner of the box, found 
no watch, and after an unavailing search, sat down in the 
dark on a bundle of rags, with the sensations of a ruined 
man. My world was withered up and gone. How the day 


48 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


passed, I cannot tell. How I got through my meals, I can- 
not even imagine. When I look back and attempt to recall 
the time, I see but a cloudy waste of misery crossed by the 
lightning-streaks of a sense of injury. All that was left me 
now was a cat-like watching for the chance of going to my 
grandmother. Into her ear I would pour the tale of my 
wrong. She who had been as a haunting discomfort to me, 
had grown to be my one consolation. 

My lessons went on as usual. A certain pride enabled me 
to learn them tolerably for a day or two; but when that faded, 
my whole being began to flag. For some time my existence 
was a kind of life in death. At length one evening my uncle 
said to me, as we flnished my lessons far from satisfactorily — 

** Willie, your aunt and I think it better you should go to 
school. We shall be very sorry to part with you, but it will 
be better. You will then have companions of your own age. 
You have not enough to amuse you at home.” 

He did not allude by a single word to the affair of the 
watch. Could my aunt have taken it, and never told him? It 
was not likely. 

I was delighted at the idea of any change, for my life had 
grown irksome to me. 

“ O, thank you, uncle I” I cried, with genuine expression. 

I think he looked a little sad ; but he uttered no reproach. 

My aunt and he had already arranged everything. The 
next day but one, I saw, for the first time, a carriage drive up 
to the door of the house. I was waiting for it impatiently. 
My new clothes had all been packed in a little box. I had 
not put in a single toy : I cared for nothing I had now. The 
box was put up beside the driver. My aunt came to the door 
where I was waiting for my uncle. 

“ Mayn’t I go and say good-bye to grannie?” I asked. 

“ She’s not very well to-day,” said my aunt. ‘‘ I think you 
had better not. You will be back at Christmas, you know.” 

I was not so much grieved as I ought to have been. The 
loss of my watch had made the thought of grannie painful 
agaia 


THE SWORD ON THE WAEL. 49 

" Your uncle will meet you at the road/* continued my 
aunt, seeing me still hesitate. “ Good-bye.** 

I received her cold embrace without emotion, clambered 
into the chaise, and looking out as the driver shut the door, 
wondered what my aunt was holding her apron to her eyes 
for, as she turned away into the house. My uncle met us and 
got in, and away the chaise rattled, bearing me towards an ut- 
terly new experience ; for hardly could the strangest region 
in foreign lands be more unknown to the wandering mariner 
than the faces and ways of even my own kind were to me. I 
never played for one half hour with boy or girl. I knew 
nothing of their playthings or their games. I hardly knew 
what boys were like, except, outwardly, from the dim reflex 
of myself in the broken mirror in my bed-room, whose lustre 
was more of the ice than the pool, and, inwardly, from the 
partly exceptional experiences of my own nature, with even 
which I was poorly enough acquainted. 


50 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

I GO TO SCHOOL, AND GRANNIE LEAVES IT. 

It is an evil thing to break up a family before the natural 
period of its dissolution. In the course of things, marriage, 
the necessities of maintenance, or the energies of labor 
guiding “ to fresh woods and pastures new,” are the ordered 
causes of separation. 

Where the home is happy, much injury is done the children 
in sending them to school, except it be a day-school, whither 
they go in the morning as to the labors of the world, but 
whence they return at night as to the heaven of repose. Con- 
flict through the day, rest at night, is the ideal. A day-school 
will suffice for the cultivation of the necessary public or na- 
tional spirit, without which the love of the family may de- 
generate into a merely extended selfishness, but which is itself 
founded upon those family afiections. At the same time, it 
must be confessed that boarding-schools are, in many cases, an 
antidote to some of the evil conditions which exist at home. 

To children whose home is a happy one, the exile to a 
school must be bitter. Mine, however, was an unusual ex- 
perience. Leaving aside the specially troubled state in which 
I was when thus carried to the village of Aldwick, I had few 
of the finer elements of the ideal home in mine. The love of 
my childish heart had never been drawn out. My grand- 
mother had begun to do so, but her influence had been 
speedily arrested. I was, as they say of cats, more attached 
to the place than the people, and no regrets whatever inter- 
fered to quell the excitement of expectation, wonder, and 
curiosity which filled me on the journey. The motion of the 
vehicle, the sound of the horses’ hoofs, the travellers we 
passed on the road — all seemed to partake of the exuberant 


I GO TO SCHOOL, AND GRANNIE LEAVES IT. 51 

life which swelled and overflowed in me. Everything was as 
happy, as excited, as I was. 

When we entered the village, behold it was a region of glad 
tumult! Were there not three dogs, two carts, a maid carry- 
ing pails of water, and several groups of frolicking children 
in the street — not to mention live ducks, and a glimpse of 
grazing geese on the common ? There were also two mothers 
at their cottage-doors, each with a baby in her arms. I knew 
they were babies, although I had never seen a baby before. 
And when we drove through the big wooden gate and stopped 
at the door of what had been the manor-house but was now 
Mr. Elder’s school, the aspect of the building, half-covered 
with ivy, bore to me a most friendly look. Still more friendly 
was the face of the master’s wife, who received us in a low dark 
parlor, with a thick soft carpet, and rich red curtains. It was 
a perfect paradise to my imagination. Nor did the appearance 
of Mr. Elder at all jar with the vision of coming happiness. 
His round, rosy, spectacled face bore in it no premonitory sug- 
gestion of birch or rod, and, although I continued at his 
school for six years, I never saw him use either. If a boy re- 
quired that kind of treatment, he sent him home. When my 
uncle left me, it was in more than contentment with my lot. 
Nor did anything occur to alter my feeling with regard to it. 
I soon became much attached to Mrs. Elder. She was just 
the woman for a schoolmaster’s wife — as full of maternity as 
she could hold, but childless. By the end of the first day I 
thought I loved her far more than my aunt. My aunt had 
done her duty towards me; but how was a child to weigh 
that ? She had taken no trouble to make me love her ; she 
had shown me none of the signs of aflfection, and I could not 
appreciate the proofs of it yet. 

I soon perceived a great difference between my uncle’s way 
of teaching and that of Mr. Elder. My uncle always ap- 
peared aware of something behind which pressed upon, per- 
haps hurried the fact he was making me understand. He 
made me feel, perhaps too much, that it was a mere step to- 
wards something beyond. Mr. Elder, on the other hand, 


52 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


placed every point in such a strong light that it seemed in 
itself of primary consequence. Both were, if my judgment 
after so many years be correct, admirable teachers — my uncle 
the greater, my schoolmaster the more immediately efficient. 
As I was a manageable boy, to the very verge of weakness, 
the relations between us were entirely pleasant. 

There were only six more pupils, all of them sufficiently 
older than myself to be ready to pet and indulge me. No one 
who saw me mounted on the back of the eldest, a lad of fifteen, 
and driving four of them in hand, while the sixth ran along- 
side as an outrider — could have wondered that I should 
find school better than home. Before the first day was over, 
the sorrows of the lost watch and sword had vanished utterly. 
For what was possession to being possessed? What was a 
watch, even had it been going, to the movements of life? To 
peep from the wicket in the great gate out upon the village 
street, with the well in the middle of it, and a girl in the sun- 
shine winding up the green dripping bucket from the unknown 
depths of coolness, was more than a thousand watches. But 
this was by no means the extent of my new survey of things. 
One of the causes of Mr. Elder’s keeping no boy who required 
chastisement was his own love of freedom, and his consequent 
desire to give the boys as much liberty out of school hours as 
possible. He believed in freedom. “ The great end of train- 
ing,” he said to me many years after, when he was quite an old 
man, “ is liberty , and the sooner you can get a boy to be a law 
to himself, the sooner you make a man of him. This end is 
impossible without freedom. Let those who have no choice, or 
who have not the same end in view, do the best they can with 
such boys as they find : I chose only such as could bear liberty. 
I never set up as a reformer — only as an educator. For that 
kind of work others were more fit than I. It was not my call- 
ing.” Hence, Mr. Elder no more allowed labor to intrude 
upon play, than play to intrude upon labor. As soon as lessons 
were over, we were free to go where we would and do what we 
would, under certain general restrictions, which had more to do 
with social proprieties than with school regulations. We 


I GO TO SCHOOL, AND GRANNIE LEAVES IT. 53 

roamed the country from tea-time till sundown; sometimes in 
the summer long after that. Sometimes also on moonlit nights 
in winter, occasionally even when the stars and the snow gave 
the only light, we were allowed the same liberty until nearly 
bedtime. Before Christmas came, variety, exercise, and social 
blessedness had wrought upon me so that when I returned 
home, my uncle and aunt were astonished at the change in me. 
I had grown half a head, and the paleness, which they had 
considered a peculiar accident of my appearance, had given 
place to a rosy glow. My flitting step too had vanished : I 
soon became aware that I made more noise than my aunt liked, 
for in the old house silence was in its very temple. My uncle, 
however, would only smile and say : 

“ Don’t bring the place about our ears, Willie, my boy. I 
should like it to last my time.” 

“ I’m afraid,” my aunt would interpose, “ Mr. Elder doesn’t 
keep very good order in his school.” 

Then I would fire up in defence of the master, and my uncle 
would sit and listen, looking both pleased and amused. 

I had not been many moments in the house before I said, — 

“Mayn’t I run up and see grannie, uncle?” 

“I will go and see how she is,” my aunt said, rising. 

She went, and presently returning, said — • 

“ Grannie seems a little better. You may come. She wants 
to see you.” 

I followed her. When I entered the room and looked ex- 
pectantly towards her usual place, I found her chair empty. I 
turned to the bed. There she was, and I thought she looked 
much the same; but when I came nearer I perceived a change 
in her countenance. She welcomed me feebly, stroked my hair 
and my cheeks, smiled sweetly, and closed her eyes. My aunt 
led me away. 

When bedtime came I went to my own room, and was soon 
fast asleep. What roused me, I do not know, but I awoke in 
the midst of the darkness, and the next moment I heard a 
groan. It thrilled me with horror. I sat up in bed and lis- 
tened, but heard no more. As I sat listening, heedless of the 


54 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


cold, the explanation dawned upon me, for my powers of re- 
flection and combination had been developed by my enlarged 
experience of life. In our many wanderings, I had learned to 
choose between roads and to make conjectures from the lie of 
the country. I had likewise lived in a far larger house than 
my home. Hence it now dawned upon me, for the first time, 
that grannie’s room must be next to mine, although approached 
from the other side, and that the groan must have been hei-s. 
She might be in need of help. I remembered at the same time 
how she had wished to have me by her in the middle of the 
night, that she might be able to tell me what she could not re- 
call in the day. I got up at once, dressed myself, and stole 
down the one stair, across the kitchen, and up the other. I 
gently opened grannie’s door, and peeped in. A fire was 
burning in the room. I entered and approached the bed. I 
wonder how I had the courage; but children more than grown 
people are moved by unlikely impulses. Grannie lay breath- 
ing heavily. I stood for a moment. The faint light flickered 
over her white face. It was the middle of the night, and the 
tide of fear inseparable from the night began to rise. My old 
fear of her began to return with it. But she lifted her lids 
and the terror ebbed away. 

She looked at me, but did not seem to know me. I went 
nearer. 

“Grannie,” I said, close to her ear, and speaking low; “you 
wanted to see me at night — that was before I went to school. 
I’m here, grannie.” 

The sheet was folded back so smooth that she could hardly 
have turned over since it had been arranged for the night. 
Her hand was lying upon it. She lifted it feebly and stroked 
mj cheek once more. Her lips murmured something which I 
could not hear, and then came a deep sigh, almost a groan. 
The terror returned when I found she could not speak to me. 

“Shall I go and fetch auntie?” I whispered. 

She shook her head feebly, and looked wistfully at me. Her 
lips moved again. I guessed that she wanted me to sit beside 
her. I got a chair, placed it by the bedside, and sat down. 


1 GO TO SCHOOL, AND GRANNIE LEAVES IT. 65 

She put out her hand, as if searching for something. I laid 
mine in it. She closed her fingers upon it and seemed satisfied. 
When I looked again, she was asleep and breathing quietly. I 
was afraid to take my hand from hers lest I should wake her. 
I laid my head on the side of the bed, and was soon fast asleep 
also 

I was awaked by a noise in the room. It was Nannie light- 
ing the fire. When she saw me she gave a cry of terror. 

“Hush, Nannie!” I said; “you will wake grannie;” and as 
I spoke I rose, for I found my hand was free. 

“Oh, Master Willie!” said Nannie, in a low voice; “how 
did you come here? You sent my heart into my mouth.” 

“Swallow it again, Nannie,” I answered, “and don’t tell 
auntie. I came to see grannie, and fell asleep. I’m rather 
cold. I’ll go to bed now. Auntie’s not up, is she?” 

“ No. It’s not time for anybody to be up yet.” 

Nannie ought to have spent the night in grannie’s room, for 
it was her turn to watch ; but finding her nicely asleep as she 
thought, she had slipped away for just an hour of comfort in 
bed. The hour had grown to three. When she returned the 
fire was out. 

When I came down to breakfast, the solemn look upon my 
uncle’s face caused me a foreboding of change. 

“ God has taken grannie away in the night, Willie,” said he, 
holding the hand I had placed in his. 

“Is she dead?” I asked. 

“ Yes,” he answered. 

“Oh, then, you will let her go to her grave now, won’t you?” 
I said — the recollection of her old grievance coming first in 
association with her death, and occasioning a more childish 
speech than belonged to my years. 

“Yes. She’ll get to her grave now,” said my aunt, with a 
trembling in her voice I had never heard before. 

“ No,” objected my uncle. “ Her body will go to tho 
grave, but her soul will go to heaven.” 

“ Her soul ! ” I said. “ What’s that? ” 

“Dear me, Willie! don’t you know that?” said mj 


56 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


aunt. “Don’t you know you’ve got a soul as well as a 
body?” 

“ I’m sure I haven’t,” I returned. “ What was grannie’s 
like?” 

“ That I can’t tell you,” she answered. 

“ Have you got one, auntie ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ What is yours like then ? 

“ I don’t know.” 

“ But,” I said, turning to my uncle, “ if her body goes to 
the grave, and her soul to heaven, what’s to become of poor 
grannie — without either of them, you see ? ” 

My uncle had been thinking while we talked. 

“ That can’t be the way to represent the thing, Jane : it 
puzzles the child. No, Willie; grannie’s body goes to the 
grave, but grannie herself is gone to heaven. What people 
call her soul is just grannie herself.” 

“ Why don’t they say so, then ? ” 

My uncle fell a thinking again. He did not, however, 
answer this last question, for I suspect he found that it would 
not be good for me to know the real cause — namely, that peo- 
ple hardly believed it, and therefore did not say it. Most 
people believe far more in their bodies than in their souls. 
What my uncle did say, was — 

“I hardly know. But grannie’s gone to heaven anyhow.” 

“I’m so glad!” I said. “She will be more comfortable 
there. She was too old, you know, uncle.” 

He made me no reply. My aunt’s apron was covering her 
face, and when she took it away, I observed that those eager, 
almost angry eyes were red with weeping. I began to feel a 
movement at my heart, the first fluttering physical sign of a 
waking love towards her. 

“ Don’t cry, auntie,” I said. “ I don’t see anything to cry 
about. Grannie has got what she wanted.” 

She m ade no answer, and I sat down to my breakfast. I 
don’t know how it was, but I could not eat it. I rose and 
took my way to the hollow in the field. I felt a strange 


I GO TO SCHOOL, AND GRANNIE LEAVES IT. 


57 


excitement, not sorrow. Grannie was actually dead at last. I 
did not quite know what it meant. I had never seen a dead 
body. Neither did I know that she had died while I slept 
with my hand in hers. Nannie had found her quite cold. Had 
we been a talking family, I might have been uneasy until I had 
told the story of my last interview with her; but I never 
thought of saying a word about it. I cannot help thinking 
now that I was waked up and sent to the old woman, my 
great grand mother, in the middle of the night, to help her to 
die in comfort. Who knows ? What we can neither prove 
nor comprehend forms, I suspect, the infinitely larger part of 
our being. 

When I was taken to see what remained of grannie, I expe- 
rienced nothing of the dismay which some children feel at the 
sight of death. It was as if she had seen something just in 
time to leave the look of it behind her there, and so the final 
expression was a revelation. For a while there seems to 
remain this one link between some dead bodies and their living 
spirits. But my aunt, with a common superstition, would 
have me touch the face. That, I confess, made me shudder: 
the cold of death is so unlike any other cold I I seemed to 
feel it in my hand all the rest of the day. 

I saw what seemed grannie — I am too near death myself to 
consent to call a dead body the man or the woman laid in 
the grave for which she had longed, and returned home with a 
sense that somehow there was a barrier broken down between 
me and my uncle and my aunt. I felt as near my uncle now 
as I had ever been. That evening he did not go to his own 
room, but sat with my aunt and me in the kitchen-hall. We 
pulled the great high-backed oaken settle before the fire, 
and my aunt made a great blaze, for it was very cold They 
sat one in each comer, and I sat between them, and told them 
many things concerning the school. They asked me questions 
and encouraged my prattle, seeming well pleased that the old 
silence should be broken. I fancy I brought them a little 
nearer to each other that night. It was after a funeral, and yet 
they both looked happier than I had ever seen them before. 


58 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER IX 

I SIN AND REPENT. 

The Christmas holidays went by more rapidly than I had 
expected. I betook myself with enlarged faculty to my book- 
mending, and more than ever enjoyed making my uncle’s old 
volumes tidy. When I returned to school, it was with real 
sorrow at parting from my uncle ; and even towards my aunt 
I now felt a growing attraction. 

I shall not dwell upon my school history. That would be 
to spin out my narrative unnecessarily. I shall only relate 
such occurrences as are guide-posts in the direction of those 
main events which properly constitute my history. 

I had been about two years with Mr. Elder. The usual 
holidays had intervened, upon which occasions I found the 
pleasures of home so multiplied by increase of liberty and the 
enlarged confidence of my uncle, who took me* about with him 
everywhere, that they were now almost capable of rivalling 
those of school. But before I relate an incident which oc- 
curred in the second autumn, I must say a few words about 
my character at this time. 

My reader will please to remember that I had never been 
driven, or oppressed in any way. The affair of the watch was 
quite an isolated instance, and so immediately followed by the 
change and fresh life of school, that it had not left a mark 
behind. Nothing had yet occurred to generate in me any 
fear before the face of man. I had been vaguely uneasy in 
relation to my grandmother, but that uneasiness had almost 
vanished before her death. Hence the faith natural to child- 
hood had received no check. My aunt was at worst cold ; 
she had never been harsh ; while over Nannie I was absolute 
ruler. The only time that evil had threatened me, I had 
been faithfully defended by my guardian uncle. At school. 


I SIN AND REPENT. 


59 


"while I found myself more under law, I yet found myself pos- 
sessed of greater freedom. Every one was friendly, and more 
than kind. From all this the result was that my nature was 
unusually trusting. 

We had a whole holiday, and, all seven, set out to enjoy 
ourselves. It was a delicious morning in autumn, clear and 
cool, with a great light in the east, and the west nowhere. 
Neither the autumnal tints nor the sharpening wind had any 
sadness in those years which we caU the old years afterwards. 
How strange it seems to have — all of us — to say with the Jew- 
ish poet : I have been young and now am old ! A wood in 
the distance, rising up the slope of a hill, was our goal, for we 
were after hazel-nuts. Frolicking, scampering, leaping over 
stiles, we felt the road vanish under our feet. When we 
gained the wood, although we failed in our quest, we found 
plenty of amusement; that grew everywhere. At length it 
was time to return, and we resolved on going home by an- 
other road — one we did not know. 

After walking a good distance, we arrived at a gate and a 
lodge, where we stopped to inquire the way. A kind-faced 
woman informed us that we should shorten it much by going 
through the park, which, as we seemed respectable boys, she 
would allow us to do. We thanked her, entered, and went 
walking along a smooth road, through open sward, clumps of 
trees, and an occasional piece of artful neglect in the shape of 
rough hillocks covered with wild shrubs, such as briar and 
broom. It was very delightful, and we walked along merrily. 
I can yet recall the individual shapes of certain hawthorn 
trees we passed, whose extreme age had found expression in a 
wild grotesqueness, which would have been ridiculous, but for 
a dim, painful resemblance to the distortion of old age in the 
human family. 

After walking some distance, we began to doubt whether we 
might not have missed the way to the gate of which the 
woman had spoken. For a wall appeared, which, to judge 
from the tree-tops visible over it, must surround a kitchen 
garden or orchard ; and from this we feared we had come too 


60 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


nigh the house. We had not gone much farther before a 
branch, projecting over the wall, from whose tip, as if the 
tempter had gone back to his old tricks, hung a rosy-cheeked 
apple, drew our eyes and arrested our steps. There are grown 
people who cannot, without an elfort of the imagination, figure 
to themselves the attraction between a boy and an apple ; but 
I suspect there are others the memories of whose boyish freaks 
will render it yet more difficult for them to understand a 
single moment’s contemplation of such an object without the 
endeavor to appropriate it. To them the boy seems made for the 
apple, and the apple for the boy. Rosy, round-faced, specta- 
cled Mr. Elder, however, had such a fine sense of honor in 
himself that he had been to a rare degree successful in devel- 
oping a similar sense in his boys, and I do believe that not 
one of us would, under any circumstances, except possibly 
those of terrifying compulsion, have pulled that apple. We 
stood in rapt contemplation for a few moments, and then 
walked away. But although there- are no degrees in Virtue, 
who will still demand her uttermost farthing, there are 
degrees in the virtuousness of human beings. 

As we walked away, I was the last, and was just passing from 
under the branch when something struck the ground at my 
heel. I turned. An apple must fall some time, and for this 
apple that some time was then. It lay at my feet. I lifted 
it and stood gazing at it — I need not say with admiration. 
My mind fell a working. The adversary was there and the 
angel too. The apple had dropped at my feet ; I had not 
pulled it. There it would lie wasting, if some one with less right 
than I— said the prince of special pleaders — was not the se- 
cond to find it. Besides, what fell in the road was public prO' 
perty. Only this was not a public road, the angel reminded 
me. My will fluttered from side to side, now turning its ear to 
my conscience, now turning away and hearkening to my im- 
pulse. At last, weary of the strife, I determined to settle it 
by a just contempt of trifles — and, half in desperation, bit into 
the ruddy cheek. 

The moment I saw the wound my teeth had made, I knew 


I SIN AND REPENT. 


61 


what I had done, and my heart died within me. I was self- 
condemned. It was a new and an awful sensation — a sensa- 
tion that could not be for a moment endured. The misery 
was too intense to leave room for repentance even. With a 
sudden resolve born of despair, I shoved the type of the broken 
law into my pocket and followed my companions. But I kept 
at some distance behind them, for as yet I dared not hold far- 
ther communication with respectable people. I did not, and 
do not now believe, that there was one amongst them who 
would have done as I had done. Probably also not one of 
them would have thought of my way of deliverance from un- 
endurable self-contempt. The curse had passed upon me, but 
I saw a way of escape. 

A few yards further, they found the road we thought we 
had missed. It struck off into a hollow, the sides of which 
were covered with trees. As they turned into it they looked 
back and called me to come on. I ran as if I wanted to over- 
take them, but the moment they were out of sight, left the 
road for the grass, and set off at full speed in the same direc- 
tion as before. I had not gone far before I was in the midst 
of trees, overflowing the hollow in which my companions had 
disappeared, and spreading themselves over the level above. 
As I entered their shadow, my old awe of the trees returned 
upon me — an awe I had nearly forgotten, but revived by my 
crime. I pressed along, however, for to turn back would have 
been more dreadful than any fear. At length, with a sudden 
turn, the road left the trees behind, and what a scene opened 
before me ! I stood on the verge of a large space of green 
sward, smooth and well kept as a lawn, but somewhat irregu- 
lar in surface. From all sides it rose towards the centre. 
There a broad, low rock seemed to grow out of it, and upon 
the rock stood the lordliest house my childish eyes had ever 
beheld. Take situation and all, and I have scarcely yet be- 
held one to equal it. Half-castle, half old English country 
seat, it covered the rock with a huge square of building, from 
various parts of which rose towers, mostly square also, of dif- 
ferent heights. I stood for one brief moment entranced with 


62 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


awful delight. A building which has grown for ages, the out* 
come of the life of powerful generations, has about it a ma- 
jesty which, in certain moods, is overpowering. Foi* one brief 
moment I forgot my sin and its sorrow. But memory awoke 
with a fresh pang. To this lordly place I, poor miserable sin- 
ner, was a debtor by wrong and shame. Let no one laugh at 
me because my sin was small ; it was enough for me, being 
that of one who had stolen for the first time, and that without 
previous declension, and searing of the conscience. I hurried 
towards the building, anxiously looking for some entrance. 

I had approached so. near that, seated on its rock, it seemed 
to shoot its towers into the zenith, when, rounding a corner, I 
came to a part where the height sank from the foundation of 
the house to the level by a grassy slope, and at the foot of the 
slope, espied an elderly gentleman in a white hat, who stood 
with his hands in his breeches-pockets, looking about him. He 
was tall and stout, and carried himself in what seemed to me 
a stately manner. As I drew near him I felt somewhat en- 
couraged by a glimpse of his face, which was rubicund and, I 
thought, good-natured ; but approaching him rather from be- 
hind, I could not see it well. When I addressed him, he 
started. 

“ Please, sir,” I said, “ is this your house ?” 

“ Yes, my man ; it is my house,” he answered, looking down 
on me with bent neck, his hands still in his pockets. 

“ Please, sir,” I said, but here my voice began to tremble, 
and he grew dim and large through the veil of my gathering 
tears. I hesitated. 

“ Well, what do you want?” he asked, in a tone half jocular, 
half kind. 

I made a great efiTort and recovered my self-possession. 

“ Please, sir,” I repeated, “ I want you to box my ears.” 

“ Well, you are a funny fellow ? What should I box your 
ears for, pray?” 

“ Because I’ve been very wicked,” I answered , and, putting 
my hand in my pocket, I extracted the bitten apple, and held 
it up to him. 


I SIN AND REPENT. 


6S 


“ Ho ! ho !” he said, beginning to guess what I must mean, 
but hardly the less bewildered for that ; “ is that one of my 
apples ?” 

“Yes, sir. It fell down from a branch that hung over the 
wall. I took it up, and — and — I took a bite of it, and — ^and 
— I’m so sorry !” 

Here I burst into a fit of crying which I choked as much as 
I could. I remember quite well how, as I stood holding out 
the apple, my arm would shake with the violence of my sobs. 

“ I’m not fond of bitten apples,” he said. “ You had better 
eat it up now.” 

This brought me to myself. If he had shown me sympathy 
I should have gone on crying. 

“ I would rather not. Please box my ears.” 

“ I don’t want to box your ears. You’re welcome to the 
apple. Only don’t take what’s not your own another time.” 

“ But, please, sir, I’m so miserable !” 

“ Home with you ! and eat your apple as you go,” was his 
unconsoling response. 

“ I can’t eat it ; I’m so ashamed of myself.” 

“ When people do wrong, I suppose they must be ashamed 
of themselves. That’s all right, isn’t it ?” 

“Why won’t you box my ears, then ?” I persisted. 

It was my sole but unavailing prayer. He turned away 
towards the house. My trouble rose to agony. I made some 
wild motion of despair, and threw myself on the grass. He 
turned, looked at me for a moment in silence, and then said in 
a changed tone, — 

“ My boy, I am sorry for you. I beg you will not trouble 
yourself any more. The affair is not worth it. Such a trifle ! 
What can I do for you ?” 

I got up. A new thought of possible relief had crossed my 
mind. 

“Please, sir, if you won’t box my ears, will you shake 
hands with me ?” 

“ To be sure, I will,” he answered, holding out his hand, and 
giving mine a very kindly shake. “ Where do you live ?” 


64 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I am at school at Aid wick, at Mr. Elder’s.” 

“ You’re a long way from home !” 

“ Am I, sir ? Will you tell me how to go ? But it’s of no 
consequence. I don’t mind anything now you’ve forgiven me. 
I shall soon run home.” 

“ Come with me first. You must have something to eat.” 

I wanted nothing to eat, but how could I oppose anything 
Jie said ? I followed him at once, drying my eyes as I went. 
He led me to a great gate which I had passed before, and 
opening a wicket, took me across a court, and through another 
building where I saw many servants going about ; then across 
a second court which was paved with large flags, and so to a 
door which he opened, calling, 

“ Mrs. Wilson ! Mrs. Wilson ! I want you a moment.” 

“Yes, Sir Giles,” answered a tall, stiff*-looking elderly 
woman who presently appeared descending, with upright spine, 
a corkscrew staircase of stone. 

“ Here is a young gentleman, Mrs. Wilson, who seems to 
have lost his way. He is one of Mr. Elder’s pupils at Ald- 
wick. Will you get him something to eat and drink, and 
then send him home ?” 

“I will. Sir Giles.” 

Good-bye, my man,” said Sir Giles, again shaking hands 
with me. Then turning anew to the housekeeper, for such I 
found she was, he added : 

“ Couldn’t you find a bag for him, and fill it with some of 
those brown pippins ? They’re good eating, ain’t they ?” 

“ With pleasure. Sir Giles.” 

Thereupon Sir Giles withdrew, closing the door behind him, 
and leaving me with the sense of life from the dead. 

“What’s your name, young gentleman?” asked Mrs. Wil- 
son, with, I thought, some degree of sternness. 

“ Wilfrid Cumbermede,” I answered. 

She stared at me a little, with a stare which would have 
been a start in most women. I was by this time calm enough 
to take a quiet look at her. She was dressed in black silk, 
with a white neckerchief crossing in front, and black mittens 


I SIN AND REPENT. 


65 


on her hands. After gazing at me fixedly for a moment or 
two, she turned away and ascended the stair, which went up 
straight from the door, saying, 

“Come with me. Master Cumbermede. You must have 
some tea before you go.” 

I obeyed, and followed her into a long, low-ceiled room, 
wainscoted all over in panels, with a square moulding at the 
top, which served for a cornice. The ceiling was ornamented 
with plaster reliefs. The windows looked out, on one side unto 
the court, on the other upon the park. The floor was black 
and polished like a mirror, with bits of carpet here and there, 
and a rug before the curious, old-fashioned grate, where a little 
fire was burning and a small kettle boiling fiercely on the top 
of it. The tea tray was already on the table. She got another 
cup and saucer, added a pot of jam to the preparations, and 
said: 

“ Sit down and have some bread and butter, while I make 
tea.” 

She cut me a great piece of bread, and then a great piece 
of butter, and I lost no time in discovering that the quality 
was worthy of the quantity. Mrs. Wilson kept a grave silence 
for a good while. At last, as she was pouring out the second 
cup, she looked at me over the tea-pot and said, 

“You don’t remember your mother, I suppose, Master Cum- 
bermede ?” 

“ No, ma’am. I never saw my mother.” 

“ Within your recollection, you mean. But you must have 
seen her, for you were two years old when she died.” 

“ Did you know my mother, then, ma’am ?” I asked, but 
without any great surprise, for the events of the day had been 
so much out of the ordinary, that I had for the time almost 
lost the faculty of wonder. 

She compressed her thin lips, and a perpendicular wrinkle 
appeared in the middle of her forehead, as she answered, 

“Yes; I knew your mother.” 

“She was very good, wasn’t she, ma’am?” I said, with my 
mouth full of bread and butter. 

6 


66 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Yes. Who told you that ? ’’ 

“ I was sure of it. Nobody ever told me.” 

“ Did they never talk to you about her 

“No, ma’am.” 

“ So you are at Mr. Elder’s are you ? ” she said, after 
another long pause, during which I was not idle, for my trouble 
being gone I could now be hungry. 

“ Yes, ma’am.” 

‘How did you come here, then ?” 

“ I walked with the rest of the boys ; but they are gone 
home without me.” 

Thanks to the kindness of Sir Giles, my fault had already 
withdrawn so far into the past, that I wished to turn my back 
upon it altogether. I saw no need for confessing it to Mrs. 
Wilson ; and there was none. 

“ Did you lose your way ? ” 

“No, ma’am.” 

“ What brought you here then ? I suppose you wanted to see 
the place.” 

“The woman at the lodge told us the nearest way was 
through the park.” 

I quite expected she would go on cross-questioning me, and 
then ail the truth would have had to come out. But, to my 
great relief, she went no further, only kept eyeing me in a 
manner so oppressive as to compel me to eat bread and butter 
and strawberry jam with self-defensive eagerness. I presume 
she trusted to find out the truth by and by. She contented 
herself in the meantime with asking questions about my uncle 
and aunt, the farm, the school, and Mr. and Mrs. Elder, all 
in a cold, stately, refraining manner, with two spots of red in 
her face — one on each cheek-bone, and a thin rather peevish * 
nose dividing them. But her forehead was good, and when 
she smiled, which was not often, her eyes shone. Still, even 
I, with my small knowledge of womankind, was dimly aware 
that she was feeling her way with me, and I did not like her 
much. 

“ Have you nearly done ? ” she asked at length. 


I SIN AND REPENT. 


67 


“ Yes, quite, thank you,” I answered. 

“Are you going back to school to-night?” 

“ Yes, ma’am ; of course.” 

“ How are you going ?” 

“ If you will tell me the way ” 

“ Do you know how far you are from Aldwick f * 

“ No, ma’am.” 

“ Eight miles,” she answered ; “ and it’s getting rather late.” 

I was seated opposite the windows to the park, and, looking 
up, saw with some dismay that the air was getting dusky. I 
rose at once saying - 

“ I must make haste. They will think I am lost.” 

“ But you can never walk so far. Master Cumbermede.” 

“Oh, but I must ! I can’t help it. I must get back as fast 
as possible.” 

“ You can never walk such a distance. Take another bit 
of cake while I go and see what can be done.” 

Another piece of cake being within the bounds of possibility, 
I might at least wait and see what Mrs. Wilson’s design was. 
She left the room and I turned to the cake. In a little while 
she came back, sat down and went on talking. I was begin- 
ning to get quite uneasy, when a maid put her head in at the 
door and said, 

“ Please, Mrs. Wilson, the dog-cart’s ready, ma’am.” 

“Very well,” replied Mrs. Wilson, ‘and turning tome. said^ 
more kindly than she had yet spoken — 

“ Now, Master Cumbermede, you must come and see me 
again. I’m too busy to spare much time when the family is 
at home ; but they are all going away the week after next, 
and if you will come and see me then I shall be glad to show 
you over the house.” 

As she spoke she rose and led the way from the room, and 
out of the court by another gate from that by which I had 
entered. At the bottom of a steep descent, a groom wai» 
waiting with the dog-cart. 

“ Here, James,” said Mrs. Wilson, “ take good care of the 
young gentleman, and put him down safe at Mr. Eider’s, 


68 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Master Wilfrid, you^ll find a hamper of apples underneath. 
You had better not eat them all yourself, you know. Here 
are two or three for you to eat by the way.” 

“ Thank you, Mrs. Wilson. No ; I’m not quite so greedy 
as that,” I answered gladly, for my spirits were high at the 
notion of a ride in a dog-cart instead of a long and dreary 
walk. 

When I was fairly in, she shook hands with me, reminding 
me that I was to visit her soon, and away went the dog-cart 
behind a high stepping horse. I had never before been in an 
open vehicle of any higher description than a cart, and the 
ride was a great delight. We went a different road from that 
which my companions had taken. It lay through trees all the 
way till we were out of the park. 

“ That’s the land-steward’s house,” said James. 

‘‘ Oh, is it?” I returned, not much interested. “What great 
trees those are all about it !” 

“ Yes ; they’re the finest elms in all the county those,” he 
answered. “ Old Coningham knew what he was about when 
he got the last baronet to let him build his nest there. Here 
we are at the gate !” 

We came out upon a country road, which ran between the 
wall of the park and a wooden fence along a field of grass. I 
offered James one of my apples, which he accepted. 

“ There, now !” he said, “ there’s a field ! — A right good bit 
o’ grass that ! Our people has wanted to throw it into the 
park for hundreds of years. But they won’t part with it for 
love or money. It ought by rights to be ours, you see, by the 
he of the country. It’s all one grass with the park. But I 
suppose them as owns it ain’t of the same mind. — Cur’ous old 
box!” he added, pointing with his whip a long way off*. 
“ You can just see the roof of it.” 

I looked in the direction he pointed. A rise in the ground 
hid all but an ancient, high-peaked roof. What was my 
astonishment to discover in it the roof of my own home I I 
was certain it could be no other. It caused a strange sensa- 
tion, to come upon it thus from the outside, as it were, when I 


I SIN AND REPENT. 


6t> 

thought myself miles and miles away from it. I fell a pon- 
dering over the matter ; and as I reflected I became convinced 
that the trees from which we had just emerged were the same 
which used to churn the wind for my childish fancies. I did 
not feel inclined to share my feelings with my new acquaint- 
ance ; but presently he put his whip in the socket and fell to 
eating his apple. There was nothing more in the conversation 
he afterwards resumed deserving of record. He pulled up at 
the gate of the school, where I bade him good-night and rang 
the bell. 

There was great rejoicing over me when I entered, for the 
boys had arrived without me a little while before, having 
searched all about the place where we had parted company, 
and came at length to the conclusion that I had played them 
a trick in order to get home without them, there having been 
some fun on the road concerning my local stupidity. Mr. 
Elder, however, took me to his own room, and read me a lec- 
ture on the necessity of not abusing my privileges. I told 
him the whole affair from beginning to end, and thought he 
behaved very oddly. He turned away every now and then, 
blew his nose, took off* his spectacles, wiped them carefully 
and replaced them before turning again to me. 

“ Go on, go on, my boy. I’m listening,” he would say. 

I cannot tell whether he was laughing or crying. I suspect 
both. When I had flnished, he said, very solemnly, 

“ Wilfrid, you have had a narrow escape. I need not tell 
you how wrong you were about the apple, for you know that 
as well as I do. But you did the right thing when your eyes 
were opened. I am greatly pleased with you, and greatly 
obliged to Sir Giles. I will write and thank him this very 
night.” 

“ Please, sir, ought I to tell the boys? I would rather not.” 

No. I do not think it necessary.” 

He rose and rang the bell. 

“ Ask Master Fox to step this way.” 

Fox was the oldest boy, and was on the point of leaving. 

“ Fox,” said Mr. Elder, “ Cumbermede has quite satisfied 


70 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


me. Will you oblige me by asking him no questions? I am 
quite aware such a request must seem strange, but I have 
good reasons for making it?.’’ 

“Very well, sir,” said Fox, glancing at me. 

“Take him with you then, and tell the rest. It is as 
a favor to myself that I put it. Fox.” 

“ That is quite enough, sir.” 

Fox took me to Mrs. Elder, and had a talk with the rest 
before I saw them. Some twenty years after, Fox and I had 
it out. I gave him a full explanation, for by that time I 
could smile over the aflair. But what does the object matter ? 
— an apple, or a thousand pounds? It is but the peg on 
which the act hangs. The act is everything. 

To the honor of my schoolfellows I record that not one of 
them ever let fall a hint in the direction of the mystery. 
Neither did Mr. or Mrs. Elder once allude to it. If possible 
Ihey were kinder than before. 


I BUILD CASTLES. 


71 


CHAPTER X. 

I BUILD CASTLES. 

My companions had soon found out, and I think the dis- 
covery had something to do with the kindness they always 
showed me, that I was a good hand at spinning a yam : the 
nautical phrase had got naturalized in the school. We had 
no chance, if we would have taken it, of spending any part 
of school hours in such a pastime ; but it formed an unfailing 
amusement when weather or humor interfered with bodily 
exercises. Xor were we debarred from the pleasure after we 
had retired for the night, — only as we were parted in three 
rooms, I could not have a large audience then. I well 
remember, however, one occasion on which it was otherwise. 
The report of a super-excellent invention having gone abroad, 
one by one they came creeping into my room, after I and my 
companion were in bed until we lay three in each bed, all 
being present but Fox. At the very heart of the climax, 
when a spectre was appearing and disappearing momently 
with the drawing in and sending out of his breath, so that 
you could not tell the one moment where he might show 
himself the next, Mr. Elder walked into the room with his 
chamber-candle in his hand, straightway illuminating six 
countenances pale with terror — for I took my full share of 
whatever emotion I roused in the rest. But instead of laying 
a general interdict on the custom, he only said, 

“ Come, come, boys ! it’s time you were asleep. Go to your 
rooms directly.” 

“ Please, sir,” faltered one — Moberly by name — the dullest 
and most honorable boy, to my thinking, amongst us, mayn’t 
I stay where I am ? Cumbermede has put me all in a shiver.” 

Mr. Elder laughed, and turning to me, asked with his 
usual good humor. 


72 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“How long will your story take, Cumbermede 

“As long as you please, sir,” I answered. 

“ I can’t let you keep them awake all night, you know.” 

“ There’s no fear of that, sir,” I replied. “ Moberly would 
have been asleep long ago if it hadn’t been a ghost. Nothing 
keeps him awake but ghosts.” 

“ Well, is the ghost nearly done with ? ” 

“Not quite, sir. The worst is to come yet.” 

“ Please, sir,” interposed Moberly, “ if you’ll let me stay 
where I am. I’ll turn round on my deaf ear, and won’t listen 
to a word more of it. It’s awful, I do assure you, sir.” 

Mr. Elder laughed again. 

“ No, no,” he said. “ Make haste and finish your story, 
Cumbermede, and let them go to sleep. You, Moberly, may 
stay where you are for the night, but I can’t have this made a 
practice of.” 

“ No, no, sir,” said several at once. 

“ But why don’t you tell your stories by daylight, Cumber- 
mede ? I’m sure you have time enough for them then.” 

“ Oh, but he’s got one going for the day and another for the 
night.” 

“ Then do you often lie three in a bed ?” asked Mr. Elder 
with some concern. 

“ Oh no, sir. Only this is an extra good one, you see.” 

Mr. Elder laughed again, bade us good-night, and left us. 
The horror however was broken. I could not call up one 
shiver more, and in a few minutes Moberly, as well as his two 
companions, had slipped away to roomier quarters. 

The material of the tales I told my companions was in part 
supplied from some of my uncle’s old books, for in his little 
library there were more than the Arcadia of the same sort. 
But these had not merely afforded me the stuff to remodel and 
imitate; their spirit had wrought upon my spirit, and armor 
and war-horses and mighty swords were only the instruments 
with which faithful knights wrought honorable deeds. 

I had a tolerably clear perception that such deeds could not 
be done in our days; that there were no more dragons lying in 


I BUILD CASTLES. 


73 


the woods; and that ladies did not now fall into the hands of 
giants. But I had the witness of an eternal impulse in my- 
self that noble deeds had yet to be done, and therefore might 
be done, although I knew not how. Hence a feeling of the 
dignity of ancient descent, as involving association with great 
men and great actions of old, and therefore rendering such 
more attainable in the future, took deep root in my mind. 
Aware of the humbleness of my birth, and unrestrained by 
pride in my parents — I had lost them so early — I would in- 
dulge in many a day-dream of what I would gladly have been. 
I would ponder over the delights of having a history, and how 
grand it would be to find I was descended from some far-away 
knight who had done deeds of high emprise. In such moods 
the recollection of the old sword that had vanished from the 
wall would return : indeed the impression it had made upon 
me may have been at the root of it all. How I longed to 
know the story of it! But it had gone to the grave with 
grannie. If my uncle or aunt knew it, I had no hope of get- 
ting it from either of them ; for I was certain they had no sym- 
pathy with any such fancies as mine. My favorite invention, 
one for which my audience was sure to call when I professed 
incompetence, and which I enlarged and varied every time I 
returned to it, was of a youth in humble life who found at 
length he was of far other origin than he had supposed. I did 
not know then that the fancy, not uncommon with boys, has 
its roots in the deepest instincts of our human nature. I need 
not add that I had not yet read Jean Paul’s Titan, or Hespe- 
rus, or Comet. 

This tendency of thought received a fresh impulse from my 
visit to Moldwarp Hall, as I choose to name the great house 
whither my repentance had led me. It was the first I had 
ever seen to wake the sense of the mighty antique. My home 
was, no doubt, older than some parts of the hall ; but the house 
we are born in never looks older than the last generation until 
we begin to compare it with others. By this time, what I had 
learned of the history of my country, and the general growth 
of the allied forces of my intellect, had rendered me capable 


74 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


of feeling the hoary eld of the great Hall. Henceforth it had 
a part in every invention of my boyish imagination. 

I was therefore not undesirous of keeping the half-engage- 
ment I had made with Mrs. Wilson ; but it was not she that 
drew me. With all her kindness, she had not attracted me; 
for cupboard-love is not the sole, or always the most powerful 
operant on the childish mind : it is in general stronger in men 
than in either children or women. I would rather not see Mrs. 
Wilson again — she had fed my body, she had not warmed my 
heart. It was the grand old house that attracted me. True, 
it was associated with shame, but rather with the recovery from 
it than with the fall itself; and what memorials of ancient 
grandeur and knightly ways must lie within those walls, to 
harmonize with my many dreams ! 

On the next holiday, Mr. Elder gave me a ready permission 
to revisit- Moldwarp Hall. I had made myself acquainted with 
the nearest way by crossroads and footpaths, and full of expec- 
tation, set out with my companions. They accompanied me 
the greater part of the distance, and left me at a certain gate, 
the same by which they had come out of the park on the day 
of my first visit. I was glad when they were gone, for I could 
then indulge my excited fancy at will. I heard their voices 
draw away into the distance. I was alone on a little footpath 
which led through a wood. All about me were strangely tall 
and slender oaks ; but as I advanced into the wood, the trees 
grew more various, and in some of the opener spaces, great old 
oaks, short and big-headed, stretched out their huge shadow- 
filled arms in true oak-fashion. The ground was uneven, and 
the path led up and down over hollow and hillock, now cross- 
ing a swampy bottom, now climbing the ridge of a rocky emi- 
nence. It was a lovely forenoon, with gray-blue sky and white 
clouds. Tdie sun shone plentifully into the wood, for the leaves 
were thin. They hung like clouds of gold and royal purple 
above my head, layer over layer, with the blue sky and the 
snowy clouds shining through. On the ground it was a world 
of shadows and sunny streaks, kept ever in interfluent motion 
by such a wind as John Skelton describes: — 


I BUILD CASTLES. 


75 


There blew in that gardynge a soft piplyng cold 
Enbrethyng of Zepherus with his pleasant wynde. 

I went merrily along. The birds were not singing, but my 
heart did not need them. It was spring-time there whatever it 
might be in the world. The heaven of my childhood wanted 
no lark to make it gay. Had the trees been bare and the frost 
shining on the ground, it would have been all the same. The 
sunlight was enough. 

I was standing on the root of a great beech-tree, gazing up 
into the gulf of its foliage, and watching the broken lights 
playing about in the leaves and leaping from twig to branch, 
like birds yet more golden than the leaves, when a voice 
startled me. 

“You’re not looking for apples in a beech-tree, hey?” it said. 

I turned instantly, with my heart in a flutter. To my great 
relief I saw that the speaker was not Sir Giles, and that pro- 
bably no allusion was intended. But my flrst apprehension 
made way only for another pang, for, although I did not know 
the man, a strange dismay shot through me at sight of him. 
His countenance was associated with an undefined but painful 
fact that lay crouching in a dusky hollow of my memory. I 
had no time now to entice it into the light of recollection. I 
took heart and spoke. 

“ No,” I answered ; “ I was only watching the sun on the 
leaves.” 

“Very pretty, ain’t it? Ah, it’s lovely! It’s quite beautiful 
— ain’t it now? You like good timber, don’t you? — Trees, I 
mean,” he explained, aware, I suppose, of some perplexity on 
my countenance. 

“Yes,” I answered. “I like big old ones best.” 

“Yes, yes,” he returned, with an energy that sounded strange 
and jarring to my mood ; “ big old ones, that have stood for 
ages — the monarchs of the forest. Saplings ain’t bad things 
either, though. But old ones are best. Just come here, and 
I’ll show you one worth looking at. It wasn’t planted yester- 
day, I can tell you.” 

I followed him along the path, until we came out of the 


76 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


wood. Beyond us the ground rose steep and high, and waa 
covered with trees; but here in the hollow it was open. A 
stream ran along between us and the height. On this side of 
the stream stood a mighty tree, towards which my companion 
led me. It was an oak with such a bushy head and such great 
roots rising in serpent rolls and heaves above the ground, that 
the stem looked stunted between them. 

“There!” said my companion; “there’s a tree! there’s some- 
thing like a tree! How a man must feel to call a tree like 
that his own ! That’s Queen Elizabeth’s oak. It is indeed. 
England is dotted with would-be Queen Elizabeth’s oaks ; but 
there is the very oak she admired so much that she ordered 
luncheon to be served under it. . . Ah ! she knew the value 
of timber — did good Queen Bess. That's now — ^now — let me 
see — the year after the Armada — nine from fifteen — ah well, 
somewhere about two hundred and thirty years ago.” 

“ How lumpy and hard it looks !” I remarked. 

“That’s the breed and the age of it,” he returned. “The 
wonder to me is they don’t turn to stone and last for ever, those 
trees. Ah! there’s something to live for now!” 

He had turned away to resume his walk, but as he finished 
the sentence, he turned again towards the tree, and shook his 
finger at it. as if reproaching it for belonging to somebody else 
than himself. 

“ Where are you going now?” he asked, wheeling round 
upon me sharply, with a keen look in his magpie-eyes, as the 
French would call them, which hardly corresponded with tho 
bluntness of his address. 

“ I’m going to the Hall,” I answered, turning away. 

“You’ll never get there that way. How are you to cross 
the river?” 

“ I don't know. I’ve never been this way before.” 

“ You’ve been to the Hall before then ? Whom do you know 
there ?” 

“ Mrs. Wilson,” I answered. 

“ Hem ! ha ! You know Mrs. Wilson, do you ? Nice 
woman, Mrs. Wilson!” 


I BUILD CASTLES. 


77 


He said this as if he meant the opposite. 

“ Here,” he went on — “ come with me. I’ll show you the 
way.” 

I obeyed and followed him along the bank of the stream. 

“ What a curious bridge !” I exclaimed as we came in 
sight ot an ancient structure lifted high in the middle on the 
point ot a Gothic arch. 

'‘Yes, ain’t it?’* he said. “Curious? I should think so! 
And well it may be I It’s as old as the oak there at least. 
There’s a bridge now for a man like Sir Giles to call his 
own !” 

“He can’t keep it though,” I said, moralizing; for, in 
carrying on the threads of my stones, I had come to see that 
no climax could last forever.. 

“ Can’t keep it I He could carry off every stone of it if he 
liked.” 

“ Then it wouldn’t be the bridge any longer.” 

“ You’re a sharp one,” he said. 

“ I don’t know,” I answered, truly enough. I seemed to 
myself to be talking sense, that was all. 

“ Well I do. What do you mean by saying he couldn’t 
keep it ?” 

“ It’s been a good many people’s already, and it’ll be some- 
body else’s some day,” I replied. 

He did not seem to relish the suggestion, for he gave a 
kind of grunt, which gradually broke into a laugh as he 
answered, 

“ Likely enough I likely enough 1” 

We had now come round to the end of the bridge, and I 
saw that it was far more curious than I had perceived 
before. 

“ Why is it so narrow ? ” I asked wonderingly, for it was 
not three feet wide, and had a parapet of stone about three 
feet high on each side of it. 

“ Ah 1 ” he replied , “ that’s it, you see. As old as the 
hills. It was built, this bridge v as, before ever a carriage was 
made — yes before ever a carrier’s cart went along a road. 


78 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


They carried everything then upon horses’ backs. They call 
this the pack-horse bridge. You see there’s room for the 
horses’ legs, and their loads could stick out over the parapets. 
That’s the way they carried everything to the Hall then. 
That was a few years before you were born, young gen- 
tleman.” 

“But they couldn’t get their legs— the horses, I mean — 
couldn’t get their legs through this narrow opening,” I 
objected , for a flat stone almost blocked up each end. 

“ No , that’s true enough. But those stones have been up 
only a hundred years or so. They didn’t want it for pack- 
horses any more then, and the stones were put up to keep the 
cattle, with which at some time or other I suppose some 
thrifty owner had stocked the park, from crossing to this 
meadow. That would be before those trees were planted up 
there ” 

When we crossed the stream, he stopped at the other end of 
the bridge and said, 

“ Now, you go that way — up the hill. There’s a kind of 
a path if you can find it, but it doesn’t much matter. Good 
morning.” 

He walked away down the bank of the stream, while I 
struck into the wood. 

When I reached the top and emerged from the trees that 
skirted the ridge, there stood the lordly Hall before me, 
shining in autumnal sunlight, with gilded vanes, and diamond- 
paned windows, as if It were a rock against which the gentle 
waves of the sea of light rippled and broke in flashes. When 
you looked at its foundation, which seemed to have torn its 
way up through the clinging sward, you could not tell where 
the building began and the rock ended. In some parts 
indeed the rock was wrought into the walls of the house; 
while in others it was faced up with stone and mortar. My 
heart beat high with vague rejoicing. Grand as the aged oak 
had looked, here was a grander growth — a growth older too 
than the oak, and inclosing within it a thousand histories. 

I approached the gate by which Mrs. Wilson had dismissed 


I BUILD CASTLES. 


79 


me. A flight of rude steps cut in the rock led to the 
portcullis which still hung, now fixed in its place, in front of 
the gate ; for though the Hall had no external defences, it 
had been well fitted for the half-sieges of troublous times. A 
modern mansion stands, with its broad sweep up to the wide 
door, like its hospitable owner in full dress and broad-bosomed 
shirt on his own hearth-rug ; this ancient house stood with its 
back to the world, like one of its ancient owners, ready to 
ride, in morion, breast-plate, and jack-boots — yet not armed 
cap-a-pie, not like a walled castle, that is. 

I ascended the steps, and stood before the arch — filled with 
a great iron-studded oaken gate — which led through a square 
tower into the court. I stood gazing for some minutes before 
I rang the bell. Two things in particular I noticed. The 
first was — over the arch of the doorway, amongst others — one 
device very like the animal’s head upon the watch and the 
seal which my great-grandmother had given me. I could not 
be sure it was the same, for the shape — both in the stone and 
in my memory— was considerably worn. The other interested 
me far more. In the great gate was a small wicket, so small 
that there was hardly room for me to pass without stooping. 
A thick stone threshold lay before it; the spot where the 
right foot must fall in stepping out of the wicket, was worn 
into the shape of a shoe, to the depth of between three and 
four inches I should judge, vertically into the stone. The 
deep foot-mould conveyed to me a sense of the coming and 
going of generations, such as I could not gather from the age- 
worn walls of the building. 

A great bell-handle at the end of a jointed iron rod, hung 
down by the side of the wicket. I rang. An old woman 
opened the wicket, and allowed me to enter. I thought I re- 
membered the way to Mrs. Wilson’s door well enough, but 
when I had ascended the few broad steps, curved to the shape 
of the corner in which the entrance stood, and found mysell 
in the flagged court, I was bewildered, and had to follow the 
retreating portress for directions. A word set me right, and I 
was soon in Mrs. Wilson’s presence. She received me kindly, 


80 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


and expressed her satisfaction that I had kept what she was 
pleased to consider my engagement. 

After some refreshment and a little talk, Mrs. Wilson 
said, 

“ Now, Master Cumbermede, would you like to go and see 
the gardens, or take a walk in the park and look at the 
deer ?’* 

“ Please, Mrs. Wilson,” I returned, “ you promised to show 
me the house.” 

“ You would like that, would you?” 

“ Yes,” I answered, — “ better than anything.” 

“ Come, then,” she said, and took a bunch of keys from the 
wall. “Some of the rooms I lock up when the family’s 
away.” 

It was a vast place. Koughly it may be described as a 
large oblong which the great hall, with the kitchen and its 
offices, divided into two square courts — ^the one flagged, the 
other gravelled. A passage dividing the hall from the 
kitchen led through from the one court to the other. We 
entered this central portion through a small tower ; and after a 
peep at the hall, ascended to a room above the entrance, 
accessible from an open gallery which ran along two sides of 
the hall. The room was square, occupying the area-space of 
the little entrance tower. To my joyous amazement, its walls 
were crowded with swords, daggers — weapons in endless 
variety, mingled with guns and pistols, for which I cared less. 
Some which had hilts curiously carved and even jewelled, 
seemed of foreign make ; their character was different from 
that of the rest ; but most were evidently of the same family 
with the one sword I knew. Mrs. Wilson could tell me 
nothing about them. All she knew was, that this was the 
armory, and that Sir Giles had a book with something written 
in it about every one of the weapons. They were no chance 
collection : each had a history. I gazed in wonder and 
delight. Above the weapons hung many pieces of armor — no 
entire suits, however ; of those there were several in the hall 
below. Finding that Mrs. Wilson did not object to my 


I BUILD CASTLES. 


81 


handling the weapons within my reach, I was soon so much 
absorbed in the examination of them, that I started when she 
spoke. 

“You shall come again, Master Cumbermede,” she said. 
“We must go now.” 

I replaced a Highland broadsword, and turned to follow 
her. She was evidently pleased with the alacrity of my obedi- 
ence, and for the first time bestowed on me a smile as she led 
the way from the armory by another door. To my enhanced 
delight this door led into the library. Gladly would I have 
lingered, but Mrs. Wilson walked on, and I followed, through 
rooms and rooms, low-pitched, and hung with tapestry, some 
carpeted, some floored with black polished oak, others with 
some kind of cement or concrete, all filled with ancient furni- 
ture whose very aspect was a speechless marvel. Out of one 
into another, along endless passages, up and down winding 
stairs, now looking from the summit of a lofty tower upon ter- 
races and gardens below — now lost in gloomy arches, again 
out upon acres of leads, and now bathed in the sweet gloom of 
the ancient chapel with its stained windows of that old glass 
which seems nothing at first, it is so modest and harmonious, 
but which for that very reason grows into a poem in the 
brain : you see it last and love it best — I followed with una- 
bating delight. 

When at length Mrs. Wilson said I had seen the whole, I 
begged her to let me go again into the library, for she had not 
given me a moment to look at it. She consented. 

It was a part of the house not best suited for the purpose, 
connected with the armory by a descent of a few steps. It lay 
over some of the housekeeping department, was too near the 
great hall, and looked into the flagged court. A library 
should be on the ground floor in a quiet wing, with an outlook 
on grass, and the possibility of gaining it at once without 
going through long passages. Nor was the library itself, 
architecturally considered, at all superior to its position. 
The books had greatly outgrown the space allotted to them, 
and several of the neighboring rooms had been annexed as 
6 


82 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


occasion required ; hence it consisted of half a dozen rooms, 
some of them merely closets intended for dressing-rooms, and 
all very ill lighted. I entered it however in no critical spirit, 
but with a feeling of reverential delight. My uncle’s books 
had taught me to love books. I had been accustomed to 
consider his five hundred volumes a wonderful library ; but 
here were thousands — as old, as musty, as neglected, as dilapi- 
dated. therefore as certainly full of wonder and discovery, as 
man or boy could wish. — Oh the treasures of a house that has 
been growing for ages ! I leave a whole roomful of lethal 
weapons, to descend three steps into six rooms full of books — 
each “ the precious life-blood of a master spirit ” — ^for as yet in 
my eyes all books were worthy ! Which did I love best ? Qld 
swords or old books ? I could not tell. I had only the grace 
to know which I ought to love best. 

As we passed from the first room into the second, up rose a 
white thing from a corner of the window-seat, and came towards 
us. I started. Mrs. Wilson exclaimed : 

“ La ! Miss Clara! how ever ? ” 

The rest was lost in the abyss of possibility. 

“ They told me you were somewhere about, Mrs. Wilson, 
and I thought I had better wait here. How do you do ?” 

“La, child, you’ve given me such a turn!” said Mrs. 
Wilson. “ You might have been a ghost if it had been in the 
middle of the night.” 

“I am very sorry, Mrs. Wilson,” said the girl merrily. 
“ Only you see if it had been a ghost it couldn’t have been 
me.’^ 

“ How’s your papa. Miss Clara ? ” 

“ Oh ! he’s always quite well.” 

“ When did you see him ? ” 

“ To-day. He’s at home with grandpapa now.” 

“ And you ran away and left him.” 

“Not quite that. He and grandpapa went out about. some 
business — to the copse at Headman’s Hollow, I think. They 
didn’t want my advice— they never do ; so I came to see you, 
Mrs. Wilson.” 


I BUILD CASTLES. 


83 


By this time I had been able to look at the girl. She was a 
year or two older than myself, I thought, and the loveliest 
creature I had ever seen. She had large blue eyes of the rare 
shade called violet, a little round perhaps, but the long lashes 
did something to rectify that fault; and a delicate nose — 
turned up a little of course, else at her age she could not have 
been so pretty. Her mouth was well curved, expressing a full 
share of Paley’s happiness ; her chin was something large and 
projecting, but the lines were fine. Her hair was light brown, 
but dark for her eyes, and her complexion would have been en- 
chanting to any one fond of the “sweet mixture, red and 
white.” Her figure was that of a girl of thirteen, undeter- 
mined — ^but therein I was not critical. “ An exceeding fail 
forehead,” to quote Sir Philip Sidney, and plump, white, dim- 
ple-knuckled hands complete the picture sufficiently for the 
present. Indeed it would have been better to say only that 1 
was taken with her, and then the reader might fancy her such 
as he would have been taken with himself. But I was not 
fascinated. It was only that I was a boy and she was a girl, 
and there being no element of decided repulsion, I felt kindly 
disposed towards her. 

Mrs. Wilson turned to me. 

“ Well, Master Cumbermede, you see I am able to give you 
more than I promised.” 

“Yes,” I returned; you promised to show me the old 
house 

“ And here,” she interposed, “ I show you a young lady as 
well.” 

“Yes, thank you,” I said simply. But I had a feeling 
that Mrs. Wilson was not absolutely well pleased. 

I was rather shy of Miss Clara — not that I was afraid of 
her, but that I did not exactly know what was expected of 
me, and Mrs. Wilson gave us no further introduction to each 
other. I was not so shy, however, as not to wish Mrs. Wilson 
would leave us together, for then, I thought, we should get on 
well enough ; but such was not her intent. Desirous of being 
agreeable^ however — as far as I knew how, and remembering 


84 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


that Mrs. Wilson had given me the choice before, I said to 
her — 

“ Mightn’t we go and look at the deer, Mrs. Wilson ?” 

“ You had better not,” she answered. “ They are rather ill- 
tempered just now. They might run at you. I heard them 
fighting last night, and knocking their horns together dread- 
fully.” 

“ Then we’d better not,” said Clara. “ They frightened me 
very much yesterday.” 

We were following Mrs. Wilson from the room. As we 
passed the hall-door we peeped in. 

“ Do you like such great high places ?” asked Clara. 

“ Yes, I do,” I answered. “ I like great high places. It 
makes you gasp somehow.” 

“Are you fond of gasping? Does it do you good?” she 
asked, with a mock simplicity which might be humor or some- 
thing not so pleasant. 

“Yes, I think it does,” I answered. “ It pleases me.” 

“ I don’t like it. I like a quiet snug place like the library 
— not a great wide place like this, that looks as if it had swal- 
lowed you and didn’t know it.” 

“ What a clever creature she is !” I thought. We turned 
away and followed Mrs. Wilson again. 

I had expected to spend the rest of the day with her, but 
the moment we reached her apartment, she got out a bottle of 
her home-made wine and s6me cake, saying it was time for me 
to go home. I was much disappointed — the more that the 
pretty Clara remained behind ; but what could I do ? I 
strolled back to Aldwick with my head fuller than ever of 
fancies, new and old. But Mrs. Wilson had said nothing of 
going to see her again, and without an invitation I could not 
venture to revisit the Hall. 

In pondering over the events of the day, I gave the man I 
had met in the woods a full share in my meditations. 


A TALK WITH MY UNCLE. 


85 


CHAPTER XL 

A TALK WITH MY UNCLE. 

When I returned home for the Christmas holidays I told 
my uncle, amongst other things, all that I have just recorded; 
for although the afiair seemed far away from me now, I felt 
that he ought to know it. He was greatly pleased with my 
behaviour in regard to the apple. He did not identify the 
place, however, until he heard the name of the housekeeper : 
then I saw a cloud pass over his face. It grew deeper when 1 
told him of my second visit, especially while I described the 
man I had met in the wood. 

“I have a strange fancy about him, uncle,” I said. “I 
think he must be the same man that came here one very stormy 
night — long ago — and wanted to take me away.” 

“ Who told you of that ?” asked my uncle, startled. 

I explained that I had been a listener. 

“You ought not to have listened.” 

“I know that now — but I did not know then. I woke 
frightened, and heard the voices.” 

“ What makes you think it was the same man ?” 

“ I can’t be sure, you know But as often as I think of the 
man I met in the wood, the recollection of that night comes 
back to me.” 

“ I dare say. What was he like?” 

I described him as well as I could. 

“Yes,” said my uncle, “I dare say. He is a dangerous 
man.” 

“ What did he want with me ?” 

“ He wanted to have something to do with your education. 
He is an old friend — acquaintance, I ought to say — of your 
father’s. I should be sorry you had any intercourse with 
him. He is a very worldly kind of man. He believes in 


86 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


money and rank, and getting on. He believes in nothing else 
that I know.” 

“ Then I am sure I shouldn't like him,” I said. 

“ I am pretty sure you wouldn’t,” returned my uncle. 

I had never before heard him speak so severely of any one. 
But from this time he began to talk to me more as if I had 
been a grown man. There was a simplicity in his way of look' 
mg at things, however, which made him quite intelligible to a 
boy as yet uncorrupted by false aims or judgments. He took 
me about with him constantly, and I began to see him as he 
was, and to honor and love him more than ever. 

Christmas-day, this year, fell on ^ Sunday. It was a model 
Christmas-day. My uncle and I walked to church in the 
morning. When we started, the grass was shining with frost, 
and the air was cold ; a fog hung about the horizon, and the 
sun shone through it with red, rayless countenance. But be- 
fore we reached the church, which was some three miles from 
home, the fog was gone, and the frost had taken shelter with 
the shadows ; the sun was dazzling, without being clear, and 
the golden cock on the spire was glittering keen in the move- 
less air. 

“What do they put a cock on the spire for, uncle?” I 
asked. 

“ To end off with an ornament, perhaps,” he answered. 

“ I thought it had been to show how the wind blew.” 

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time great things — I mean 
the spire, not the cock — ^had been put to little uses.” 

“ But why should it be a cock,” I asked, “ more than any 
other bird ?” 

“ Some people — those to whom the church is chiefly histori- 
cal — would tell you it is the cock that rebuked St. Peter. 
Whether it be so or not, I think a better reason for putting it 
there would be that the cock is the first creature to welcome 
the light, and tell people that it is coming. Hence it is a sym- 
bol of the clergyman.” 

“But our clergyman doesn’t wake the people, uncle. I’ve 
seen him send you to sleep sometimes.” 


A TALK WITH MY UNCLE. 


87 


My uncle laughed. 

“ I dare say, there are some dull cocks, too,” he answered. 

There s one at the farm,” I said, “ which goes on crowing 
every now and then all night — in his sleep — Janet says. But 
it never wakes till all the rest are out in the yard.” 

My uncle laughed again. We had reached the church- 
yard : and by the time we had visited grannie’s grave — that 
was the only one I thought of in the group of family mounds — 
the bells had ceased, and we entered. 

I at least did not sleep this morning ; not, however, because 
of the anti-somnolence of the clergyman but that, in a pew 
not far off from me, sat Clara. I could see her as often as I 
pleased to turn my head half-way round. Church is a very 
favorable place for falling in love. It is all very well for the 
older people to shake their heads and say you ought to be 
minding the service — that does not affect the fact stated — espe- 
cially when the clergyman is of the half-awake order, who take 
to the church as a gentleman -like profession. Having to sit 
so still, with the pretty face so near, with no obligation to pay 
it attention, but with perfect liberty to look at it, a boy in the 
habit of inventing stories could hardly help fancying himself 
in love with it. Whether she saw me or not, I cannot tell. 
Although she passed me close as we came out, she did not look 
my way, and I had not the hardihood to address her. 

As we were walking home, my uncle broke the silence. 

“ You would like to be an honorable man, wouldn’t you, 
Willie?” he said. 

Yes, that I should, uncle.” 

“ Could you keep a secret now?” 

‘‘Yes, uncle.” 

“ But there are two ways of keeping a secret.” 

“ I don’t know more than one.” 

“ What’s that ?” 

“ Not to tell it.” 

“Never to show that you knew it, would be better still.” 

“Yes, it would— ” 

“ But, suppose a thing : — suppose you knew that there was 


88 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


a secret ; suppose you wanted very much to find it out, and 
yet would not try to find it out : wouldn’t that be another way 
of keeping it ?” 

“ Yes, it would. If I knew there was a secret, I should like 
to find it out.” 

“ Well, I am going to try you. There is a secret. I know 
it ; you do not. You have a right to know it some day, but 
not yet. I mean to tell it you, but I want you to learn a great 
deal first. I want to keep the secret from hurting you. Just 
as you would keep things from a baby which would hurt him, 
I have kept some things from you.” 

“ Is the sword one of them, uncle ?” I asked. 

“You could not do anything with the secret if you did 
know it,” my uncle went on, without heeding my question ; 
“ but there may be designing people who would make a tool 
of you for their own ends. It is far better you should be ig* 
norant. Now, will you keep my secret? — or, in other words, 
will you trust me ?” 

I felt a little frightened. My imagination was at work on 
the formless thing. But I was chiefly afraid of the promise — 
lest I should anyway break it. 

“ I will try to keep the secret — keep it from myself, that is — 
ain’t it, uncle ?” 

“ Yes. That is just what I mean.” 

“ But how long will it be for, uncle ?” 

“ I am not quite sure. It will depend on how wise and 
sensible you grow. Some boys are men at eighteen — some not 
at forty. The more reasonable and well-behaved you are, the 
sooner shall I feel at liberty to tell it you.” 

Pe ceased, and I remained silent. I was not astonished. 
The vague news fell in with all my fancies. The possibility 
of something pleasant, nay, even wonderful and romantic, of 
course suggested itself, and the hope which thence gilded the 
delay tended to reconcile me to my ignorance. 

“ I think it better you should not go back to Mr. Elder’s, 
Willie,” said my uncle. 

I was stunned at the words. Where could a place be found 


A TALK WITH MY UNCLE. 


8d 

to compare for blessedness with Mr. Elder’s school ? Not even 
the great Hall, with its acres of rooms and its age-long history, 
could rival it. 

Some moments passed before I could utter a faltering 
‘‘Why?” 

“That is part of my secret, Willie,” answered my uncle. 
“ I know it will be a disappointment to you, for you have been 
very happy with Mr. Elder.” 

“Yes, indeed,” I answered. It was all I could say, for the 
tears were rolling down my cheeks, and there was a great lump 
in my throat. 

“ I am very sorry indeed to give you pain, Willie,” he said, 
kindly. 

“ It’s not my blame, is it, uncle ?” I sobbed. 

“Not in the least, my boy.” 

“ Oh ! then, I don’t mind it so much.” 

“There’s a brave boy! Now the question is, what to do 
with you.” 

“ Can’t I stop at home, then ?” 

“ No, that won’t do either, Willie. I must have you taught, 
and I haven’t time to teach you myself. Neither am I a 
scholar enough for it now ; my learning has got rusty. I know 
your father would have wished to send you to College, and 
although I do not very well see how I can manage it, I must 
do the best I can. I’m not a rich man, you see, Willie, 
though I have a little laid by. I never could do much at 
making money, and I must not leave your aunt unprovided 
for.” 

“No, uncle. Besides, I shall soon be able to work for 
myself and you too.” 

“ Not for a long time if you go to College, Willie. But we 
need not talk about that yet.” 

In the evening I went to my uncle’s room. He was sitting 
by his fire reading the New Testament. 

“ Please, uncle,” I said, “will you tell me something about 
my father and mother?” 

“With pleasure, my boy,” he answered, and after a 


90 


WILFKID CUMBEKMEDE. 


moment’s thought began to give me a sketch of my father’s 
life, with as many touches of the man himself as he could at 
the moment recall. I will not detain my reader with the nar- 
rative. It is sufficient to say that my father was a simple 
honorable man, without much education, but a great lover of 
plain books. His health had always been delicate ; and before 
he died he had been so long an invalid that my mother’s 
health had given way in nursing him, so that she very soon 
followed him. As his narrative closed my uncle said : “Now 
Willie, you see, with a good man like that for your father, 
you are bound to be good and honorable. Never mind 
whether people praise you or not ; you do what you ought to 
do. And don’t be always thinkiug of your rights. There are 
people who consider themselves very grand because they can’t 
bear to be interfered with. They think themselves lovers of 
justice, when it is only justice to themselves they care about. 
The true lover of justice is one who would rather die a slave 
than interfere with the rights of others. To wrong any one is 
the most terrible thing in the world. Injustice to you is not 
an awful thing like injustice in you. I should like to see you 
a great man, Willie. Do you know what I mean by a great 
man ?” 

“Something else than I know, I’m afraid, uncle,” I an- 
swered. 

“ A great man is one who will try to do right against the 
devil himself ; one who will not do wrong to please anybody 
or to save his life.” 

I listened, but I thought with myself a man might do all 
that, and be no great man. I would do something better — 
some fine deed or other — I did not know what now, but I 
should find out by and by. My uncle was too easily pleased ; 
I should demand more of a great man. Not so did the 
knights of old gain their renown. I was silent. 

“ I don’t want you to take my opinions as yours, you know, 
Willie,” my uncle resumed. “ But I want you to remember 
what my opinion is.” 

As he spoke, he went to a drawer in the room, and brought 


A TALK WITH MY UNCLE. 91 

out something which he put in my hands. I could hardly 
believe my eyes. It was the watch grannie had given me. 

“ There,” he said, “ is your father’s watch. Let it keep you 
in mind that to be good is to be great.” 

“ O thank you, uncle 1” I said, heeding only my recovered 
treasure. 

“ But didn’t it belong to somebody before my father? Gran- 
nie gave it me as if it had been hers.” 

“Your grandfather gave it to your father; but when he 
died, your great-grandmother took it. Did she teU you any- 
thing about it?” 

“ Nothing particular. She said it was her husband’s.” 

“ So it was, I believe.” 

“ She used to call him my father.” 

“ Ah, you remember that !” 

“ I’ve had so much time to think about things, uncle !” 

“Yes. Well— I hope you will think more about things 
yet.” 

“ Yes, uncle. But there’s something else I should like to 
ask you about.” 

“ What’s that?” 

“ The old sword.” 

My uncle smiled, and rose again, saying: 

“ Ah ! I thought as much. Is that anything like it ?” he 
added, bringing it from the bottom of a cupboard. 

I took it from his hands with awe. It was the same. If I 
could have mistaken the hilt, I could not mistake the split 
sheath. 

“ Oh, uncle !” I exclaimed, breathless with delight. 

“That’s it— isn’t it?” he said, enjoying my enjoyment. 

“ Yes, that it is ! Now tell me all about it, please.” 

“ Indeed I can tell you very little. Some ancestor of ours 
fought with it somewhere. There was a story about it, but I 
have forgot it. You may have it if you like. 

“ No, uncle I May I ? To take away with me ?” 

“ Yes. I think you are old enough now not to do any mis- 
chief with it.” 


92 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I do not believe there was a happier boy in England that 
night. I did not mind where I went now. I thought I could 
even bear to bid Mrs. Elder farewell. Whether therefore 
possession had done me good, I leave my reader to judge. 
But happily for our blessedness, the joy of possession soon 
palls, and not many days had gone by before I found I had a 
heart yet. Strange to say, it was my aunt who touched it. 

I do not yet know all the reasons which brought my uncle 
to the resolution of sending me abroad : it was certainly an 
unusual mode of preparing one for the university ; but the 
next day he disclosed the plan to me. I was pleased with the 
notion. But my aunt’s apron went up to her eyes. It was a 
very hard apron, and I pitied those eyes although they were 
fierce. 

“Oh, auntie!” I said, “what are you crying for? Don’t 
you like me to go ?” 

“ It’s too far off, child. How am I to get to you if you 
should be taken ill ?” 

Moved both by my own pleasure and her grief, I got up 
and threw my arms round her neck. I had never done so 
before. She returned my embrace and wept freely. 

As it was not a fit season for traveling, and as my uncle 
had not yet learned whither it would be well to send me, it 
was after all resolved that I should return to Mr. Elder’s for 
another half-year. This gave me unspeakable pleasure ; and 
I set out for school again in such a blissful mood as must be 
rare in the experience of any life. 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 


93 


CHAPTER XIL 

THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 

My uncle had had the watch cleaned and repaired for me, 
no that notwithstanding its great age, it was yet capable of a 
doubtfiil sort of service. Its caprices were almost human, but 
they never impaired the credit of its possession in the eyes of 
my schoolfellows ; rather they added to the interest of the 
little machine, inasmuch as no one-could foretell its behaviour 
under any circumstances. We were far oftener late now, 
when we went out for a ramble. Heretofore we had used our 
faculties and consulted the sky — ^now we trusted to the watch, 
and indeed acted as if it cou^ld regulate the time to our con- 
venience, and carry us home afterwards. We regarded it, in 
respect of time, very much as some people regard the Bible in 
respect of eternity. And the consequences were similar. We 
made an idol of it, and the idol played us the usual idol- 
pranks. 

But I think the possession of the sword, in my own eyes too 
a far grander thing than the watch, raised me yet higher in 
the regard of my companions. We could not be on such inti- 
mate terms with the sword, for one thing, as with the watch. 
It was in more senses than one beyond our sphere —a thing to 
be regarded with awe and reverence. Mr. Elder had most 
wisely made no objection to my having it in our bed-room ; 
but he drove two nails into the wall, and hung it high above 
my reach, saying the time had not come for my handling it. 
I believe the good man respected the ancient weapon, and 
wished to preserve it from such usage as it might have met 
with from boys. It was the more a constant stimulus to my 
imagination, and I believe insensibly to my moral nature as 
well, connecting me in a kind of dim consciousness with fore- 
gone ancestors who had, I took it for granted, done well on 
the battle-field. I had the sense of an inherited character to 


94 


WILFEID CUMBERMEDE. 


sustain in the new order of things. But there was more in 
its influence which I can hardly define — the inheritance of it 
even gave birth to a certain sense of personal dignity. 

Although I never thought of visiting Moldwarp Hall again 
without an invitation, I took my companions more than once 
into the woods which lay about it ; thus far I used the right 
of my acquaintance with the housekeeper. One day in 
spring, I had gone with them to the old narrow bridge. I 
was particularly fond of visiting it. We lingered a long time 
about Queen Elizabeth’s oak ; and by climbing up on each 
other’s shoulders, and so gaining some stumps of vanished 
boughs, had succeeded in clambering, one after another, into 
the wilderness of its branches, where the young buds were 
now pushing away the withered leaves before them, as the 
young generations of men push the older into the grave. 
When my turn came, I climbed and climbed until I had 
reached a great height in its top. Then I sat down, holding 
by the branch over my head, and began to look about me. 
Below was an entangled net, as it seemed — a labyrinth of* 
boughs, branches, twigs, and shoots. If I had fallen I could 
hardly have reached the earth. Through this environing 
mass of lines, I caught glimpses of the country around — 
green fields, swelling into hills, where the fresh foliage was 
bursting from the trees ; and below, the little stream ever pur- 
suing its busy way, by a devious but certain path to its un- 
known future. Then my eyes turned to the tree-clad ascent 
on the opposite side : through the topmost of its trees shone a 
golden spark, a glimmer of yellow fire. It was the vane on 
the highest tower of the Hall. A great desire seized me to 
look on the lordly pile once more. I descended in haste, and 
proposed to my companions that we should climb through the 
woods, and have a peep at the house. The eldest, who was in 
a measure in charge of us — ^his name was Bardsley, for Fox 
was gone — proposed to consult my watch first. Had we known 
that the faithless thing had stopped for an hour and a half, 
and then resumed its onward course as if nothing had hap- 
pened, we should not have delayed our return. As it was, ofi* 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 


95 


we scampered for the pack-horse bridge, which we left behind 
us only after many frog-leaps over the obstructing stones at 
the ends. Then up through the wood we went like wild crea- 
tures, abstaining however from all shouting and mischief, 
aware that we were on sufferance only. At length we stood 
on the verge of the descent, when, to our surprise, we saw the 
sun getting low in the horizon. Clouds were gathering over- 
head, and a wailful wind made one moaning sweep through 
the trees behind us in the hollow. The sun had hidden his 
shape but not his splendor in the skirts of the white clouds 
which were closing in around him. Spring as it was, I 
thought I smelled snow in the air. But the vane which had 
drawn me shone brilliant against a darkening cloud, like a 
golden bird in the sky. We looked at each other, not in dis- 
may exactly, but with a common feeling that the elements 
were gathering against us. The wise way would of course 
have been to turn at once and make for home ; but the watch 
had to be considered. Was the watch right, or was the watch 
wrong ? Its health and conduct were of the greatest interest 
to the common weal. That question must be answered. We 
looked from the watch to the sun, and back from the sun to 
the watch. Steady to all appearance as the descending sun 
itself, the hands were trotting and crawling along their 
appointed way, with a look of unconscious innocence, in the 
midst of their diamond coronet. I volunteered to settle the 
question: I would run to the Hall, ring the bell, and ask 
leave to go as far into the court as to see the clock on the cen- 
tral tower. The proposition was applauded. I ran, rang, and 
being recognized by the portress, was at once admitted. In a 
moment I had satisfied myself of the treachery of my bosom- 
friend, and was turning to leave the court, when a lattice 
opened, and I heard a voice calling my name. It was Mrs. 
Wilson’s. She beckoned me. I went up under the window. 

“Why don’t you come and see me. Master Cumbermede?’' 
she said. 

“You didn’t ask me, Mrs. Wilson. I should have liked to 
come very much.” 


96 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Come in, then, and have tea with me now.” 

“No, thank you,” I answered. “ My schoolfellows are wait- 
ing for me, and we are too late already. I only came to see 
the clock.” 

“ Well, you must come soon, then.” 

“ I will, Mrs. Wilson. Good-night,” I answered, and away 
I ran, opened the wicket for myself, set my foot in the deep 
shoe-mould, then rushed down the rough steps and across the 
grass to mj companions. 

When they heard what time it was, they turned without a 
word, and in less than a minute we were at the bottom of the 
hill and over the bridge. The wood followed us with a moan 
which was gathering to a roar. Down in the meadow it was 
growing dark. Before we reached the lodge it had begun to 
rain, and the wind, when we got upon the road, was blowing a 
gale. We were seven miles from home. Happily the wind 
was in our back, and, wet to the skin, but not so weary because 
of the aid of the wind, we at length reached Aldwick. The 
sole punishment we had for being so late — and that was more 
a precaution than punishment — was that we had to go to bed 
immediately after a hurried tea. To face and fight the ele- 
ments is, however, an invaluable lesson in childhood, and I 
do not think those parents do well who are over careful to 
preserve all their children from all inclemencies of weather or 
season. 

When the next holiday drew near, I once more requested 
and obtained permission to visit Mold warp Hall. I am now 
puzzled to understand why my uncle had not interdicted it, 
but certainly he had laid no injunctions upon me in regard 
thereto. Possibly he had communicated with Mrs. Wilson : I 
do not know. If he had requested Mr. Elder to prevent me, 
I could not have gone. So far, however, must this have been 
from being the case, that on the eve of the holiday, Mr. Elder 
said to me : 

“If Mrs. Wilson should ask you to stay all night, you 
may.” 

I suspect he knew more about some things than I did. The 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 97 

notion of staying all night seemed to me, however, out of the 
question. Mrs. Wilson could not be expected to entertain me 
to that extent. I fancy, though, that she had written to make 
the request. My schoolfellows accompanied me as far as the 
bridge, and there left me. Mrs. Wilson received me with 
notable warmth, and did propose that I should stay all night, 
to which I gladly agreed, more, it must be confessed, from the 
attraction of the old house than the love I bore to Mrs. Wil- 
son. 

“ But what is that you are carrying T she asked. 

It was my sword. This requires a little explanation. 

It was natural enough that on the eve of a second visit, as I 
hoped, to the armory, I should, on going up to bed, lift my 
eyes with longing look to my own sword. The thought 
followed — what a pleasure it would be to compare it with the 
other swords in the armory. If I could only get it down and 
smuggle it away with me! It was my own. I believed Mr. 
Elder would not approve of this ; but at the same time he had 
never told me not to take it down : he had only hung it too 
high for any of us to reach it — almost close to the ceiling in 
fact. But a want of enterprise was not then a fault of mine, 
and the temptation was great. So when my chum was asleep, 
I rose, and, by the remnant of a fading moon, got together the 
furniture — no easy undertaking, when the least noise would 
have betrayed me. Fortunately there was a chest of drawers 
not far from under the object of my ambition, and I managed 
by lialf inches to move it the few feet necessary. On the top 
of this I hoisted the small dressing-table, which, being only of 
deal, was very light. The chest of drawers was large enough 
to hold my small box beside the table. I got on the drawers 
by means of a chair, then by means of the box I got on the 
table, and so succeeded in getting down the sword. Having 
replaced the furniture, I laid the weapon under my bolster, 
and was soon fast asleep. The moment I woke I got up, and 
before the house was stirring had deposited the sword in an 
outbuilding whence I could easily get it off the premises. Of 
course my companions knew, and I told them all my designs. 

7 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Moberly hinted that I ought to have asked Mr. Elder, but hig 
was the sole remark in that direction. 

“ It is my sword, Mrs. Wilson,” I answered. 

“ How do you come to have a sword ?” she asked. “ It is 
hardly a fit plaything for you.” 

I told her how it had been in the house since long before I 
was born, and that I had brought it to compare with some of 
the swords in the armory. 

“ Very well,” she answered. “ I dare say we can manage 
it ; but when Mr. Close is at home, it is not veiy easy to get 
into the armory. He’s so jealous of any one touching his 
swords and guns !” 

“ Who is Mr. Close, then ?” 

Mr. Close is the house-steward.” 

“ But they’re not his then, are they ?’' 

“ It’s quite enough that he thinks so. He has a fancy for 
that sort of thing. I’m sure I don’t see anything so precious 
in the rusty old rubbish.” 

I suspected that, as the saying is, there was no love lost be- 
tween Mrs. Wilson and Mr. Close. I learned afterwards that 
he had been chaplain to a regiment of foot, which, according 
to rumor, he had had to leave for some misconduct. This was 
in the time of the previous owner of Moldwarp Hall, and no- 
body now knew the circumstances under which he had become 
house-steward— a position in which Sir Giles, when he came to 
the property, had retained his services. 

“We are going to have company, and a dance, this eve- 
ning,” continued Mrs. Wilson. “ I hardly know what to do 
with you, my hands are so full.” 

This was not very consistent with her inviting me to stay all 
night, and confirms my suspicion that she had made a request 
of that purport of Mr. Elder, for otherwise, surely, she would 
have sent me home. 

“ Oh ! never mind me, Mrs. Wilson,” I said. “ If you will 
let me wander about the place, I shall be perfectly comfortable. ” 

“ Yes ; but you might get in the way of the family, or the 
visitors,” she said. 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 


99 


“ I’ll take good care of that,” I returned. “ Surely there is 
room in this huge place without running against any one.” 

“ There ought to be,” she answered. 

After a few minutes’ silence, she resumed, 

“We shall have a good many of them staying all night, 
but there will be room for you, I dare say. What would you 
like to do with yourself till they begin to come ?” 

“ I should like to go to the library,” I answered, thinking, 
I confess, of the adjacent armory as well. “ Should I be in 
the way there ?” 

“ No ; I don’t think you would,” she replied, thoughtfully. 
“ It’s not often any one goes there.” 

“ Who takes charge of the books ?” I asked. 

“ Oh ! books don’t want much taking care of,” she replied. 
“ I have thought of having them down and dusting the place 
out, but it would be such a job ! and the dust don’t signify 
upon old books. They ain’t of much count in this house. 
Nobody heeds them.” 

“ I wish Sir Giles would let me come and put them in order 
in the holidays,” I said, little knowing how altogether unfit I 
yet was for such an undertaking. 

“ Ah, well ! we’ll see. Who knows ?” 

“ You don’t think he would !” I exclaimed. 

“ I don’t know. Perhaps he might. But I thought you 
were going abroad soon.” 

I had not said anything to her on the subject. I had never 
had an opportunity. 

“ Who told you that, Mrs. Wilson?” 

“ Never you mind. A little bird. Now you had better go 
to the library. I dare say you won’t hurt anything, for Sir 
Giles, although he never looks at the books, would be dread- 
fully angry if he thought anything were happening to them.” 

“ I’ll take as good care of them as if they were my uncle's. 
He used to let me handle his as much as I liked. I used to 
mend them up for him. I’m quite accustomed to books, I as- 
sure you, Mrs. Wilson.” 

“ Come then ; I will show you the way,” she said. 


100 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


** I think I know the way,” I answered. For I had pon- 
dered so much over the place, and had, I presume, filled so 
many gaps of recollection with creations of fancy, that I quite 
believed I knew my way all about the house. 

“ We shall see,” she returned with a smile. “ I will take 
you the nearest way, and you shall tell me on your honor if 
you remember it.” 

She led the way, and I followed. Passing down the stone 
stair and through several rooms, mostly plain bed-rooms, we 
arrived at a wooden staircase of which there were few in the 
place. We ascended a little way, crossed one or two rooms 
more, came out on a small gallery open to the air, a sort of 
covered bridge across a gulf in the building, re-entered, and 
after crossing other rooms, tapestried, and to my eyes richly 
furnished, arrived at the first of those occupied by the library. 

“ Now did you know the way, Wilfrid ?” 

-“Not in the least,” I answered. “I cannot think how I 
could have forgotten it so entirely. I am ashamed of myself.” 

“You have no occasion,” she returned. “You never went 
that way at all.” 

“ Oh, dear me !” I said ; “ what a place it is ! I might lose 
myself in it for a week.” 

“You would come out somewhere, if you went on long 
enough, I dare say. But you must not leave the library till I 
come and fetch you. You will want some dinner before long.” 

“ What time do you dine ?” I asked, putting my hand to 
my watch-pocket 

“ Ah ! you’ve got a watch — have you ? But indeed on a day 
like this, I dine when I can. You needn’t fear. I will take 
care of you.” 

“ Mayn’t I go into the armory ?” 

“ If you don’t mind the risk of meeting Mr. Close. But 
he’s not likely to be there to-day.” 

She left me with fresh injunctions not to stir till she came 
for me. But I now felt the place to be so like a rabbit-warren, 
that I dared not leave the library, if not for the fear of being 
lost, then for the fear of intruding upon some of the family. I 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 


101 


soon nestled in a corner, with books behind, books before, and 
books all around me. After trying several spots, like a miner 
searching for live lodes, and finding nothing auriferous to my 
limited capacities and tastes, I had at length struck upon a 
rich vein, had instantly dropped on the floor, and, with my 
back against the shelves, was now immersed in “ The Seven 
Champions of Christendom.” As I read, a ray of light which 
had been creeping along the shelves behind me, leaped upon 
my page. I looked up. I had not yet seen the room so light. 
Nor had I perceived before in what confusion and with what 
disrespect the books were heaped upon the shelves. A dim 
feeling awoke in me that to restore such a world to order 
would be like a work of creation ; but I sunk again forthwith 
in the delights of a feast provided for an imagination which 
had in general to feed itself. I had here all the delight of in- 
vention without any of its eflTort. 

At length I became aware of some weariness. The sun- 
beam had vanished, not only from the page, but from the 
room. I began to stretch my arms. As the tension of their 
muscles relaxed, my hand fell upon the sword which I had 
carried with me and laid on. the finor by my side. It awoke 
another mental nerve. I would go and see the armory. 

I arose, and wandered slowly through room after room of 
the library, dragging my sword after me. When I reached 
the last, there, in the corner next the outer wall of the house, 
rose the three stone steps, leading to the little door that com- 
municated with the treasury of ancient strife. I stood at the 
foot of the steps, irresolute for a moment, fearful lest my black 
man, Mr. Close, should be within, polishing his weapons per- 
haps, and fearful in his wrath. I ascended the steps, listened 
at the door, heard nothing, lifted the old, quaintly-formed 
latch, peeped in, and entered. There was the whole collec- 
tion, abandoned to my eager gaze and eager hands ! How 
long I stood, taking down weapon after weapon, examining 
each like an old book, speculating upon modes of use, and in- 
tention of varieties in form, poring over adornment and mount- 
ing, I cannot tell. Historically the whole was a sealed book ; 


102 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


individually I made a thorough acquaintance with not a few, 
noting the differences and resemblances between them and my 
own, and instead of losing conceit of the latter, finding more 
and more reasons for holding it dear and honorable. I was 
poising in one hand, with the blade upright in the air — ^for 
otherwise I could scarcely have held it in both~a huge, two- 
handed, double-hilted sword, with serrated double edge, when 
I heard a step approaching, and before I had well replaced 
the sword, a little door in a corner which I had scarcely no- 
ticed — the third door to the room — opened, and down the last 
steps of the narrowest of winding stairs, a little man in black 
screwed himself into the armory. I was startled but not alto- 
gether frightened. I felt myself grasping my own sword some- 
what nervously in my left hand, as I abandoned the great one, 
and let it fall back with a clang into its corner. 

“ By the powers !” exclaimed Mr. Close, revealing himself an 
Irishman at once in the surprise of my presence, “ and whom 
have we here?” — I felt my voice tremble a little as I replied: 

“ Mrs. Wilson allowed me to come, sir. I assure you I have 
not been hurting anything.” 

“ Who’s to tell that ? Mrs. Wilson has no business to let 
any one come here. This is my quarters. There — you’ve got 
one in your hand now! You’ve left finger-marks on the blade. 
I’ll be bound. Give it me.” 

He stretched out his hand. I drew back. 

“ This one is mine,” I said. 

“ Ho, ho, young gentleman! So you’re a collector — are you? 
Already, too! Nothing like beginning in time! Let me look 
at the thing, though.” 

He was a little man, as I have said, dressed in black, with a 
frock coat and a deep white neckcloth. His face would have 
been vulgar, especially as his nose was a traitor to his mouth, 
revealing in its hue the proclivities of its owner, but for a cer- 
tain look of the connoisseur which went far to redeem it. The 
hand which he stretched out to take my weapon was small and 
delicate — like a woman’s indeed. His speech was that of a 
gentleman. I handed him the sword at once. 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 


103 


He had scarcely glanced at it when a strange look passed 
over his countenance. He tried to draw it, failed, and looking 
all along the sheath, saw its condition. Then his eyes flashed. 
He turned from me abruptly, and went up the stair he had 
descended. I waited anxiously for what seemed to me half an 
hour: I dare say it was not more than ten minutes. At last I 
heard him revolving on his axis down the corkscrew staircase. 
He entered and handed me my sword, saying — 

“There! I canT get it out of the sheath. It’s in a horrid 
state of rust. Where did you fall in with it?” 

I told him all I knew about it. If he did not seem exactly 
interested, he certainly behaved with some oddity. When I 
told him what my grandmother had said about some battle in 
which an ancestor had worn it, his arm rose with a jerk, and 
the motions of his face, especially of his mouth, which appeared 
to be eating its own teeth, were for a moment grotesque. When 
I had flnished, he said, with indifferent tone, but eager face — 

“Well, it’s a rusty old thing, but I like old weapons. I’ll 
give you a bran new ofiicer’s sword, as bright as a mirror, for 
it — I will. There now! Is it a bargain ?” 

“ I could not part with it, sir — ^not for the best sword in the 
country,” I answered. “ You see it has been so long in our 
family.” 

“ Hem, ha ! You’re quite right, my boy. I wouldn’t if I 
were you. But as I see you know how to set a right value on 
such a weapon, you may stay and look at mine as long as you 
like. Only if you take any of them from their sheaths, you 
must be very careful how you put them in again. Don’t use 
any force. If there is any one you can’t manage easily, just 
lay it on the window-sill, and I will attend to it. Mind you 
don’t handle — I mean touch the blades at all. There would 
be no end of rust-spots before morning.” 

I was full of gratitude for the confidence he placed in me. 

“I can’t stop now to tell you about them all, but I will — 
some day.” 

So saying he disappeared once more up the little staircase, 
leaving me like Aladdin in the jewel-forest. I had not been 


104 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


alone more than half an hour or so, however, when he returned, 
and taking down a dagger, said abruptly : 

“ There, that is the dagger with which Lord Harry Rolle- 
ston ” — think that was the name, but knowing nothing of the 
family or its history, I could not keep the names separate — 
“stabbed his brother Gilbert. And there is ” 

He took down one after another, and with every one he as- 
sociated some fact — or fancy perhaps, for I suspect now that 
he invented not a few of his incidents. 

“ They have always been fond of weapons in this house,” he 
said. “There now is one with the strangest story! It’s in 
print — I can show it you in print in the library there. It had 
the reputation of being a magic sword ” 

“ Like King Arthur’s Excalibur ?” I asked, for I had read 
a good deal of the history of Prince Arthur. 

“Just so,” said Mr. Close. “Well, that sword had been in 
the family for many years — I may say centuries. One day it 
disappeared, and there was a great outcry. A lackey had been 
discharged for some cause or other, and it was believed he had 
taken it. But before they found him, the sword was in its 
place upon the wall. Afterwards the man confessed that he 
had taken it, out of revenge, for he knew how it was prized. 
But in the middle of the next night, as he slept in a roadside 
inn, a figure dressed in ancient armor had entered the room, 
taken up the sword, and gone away with it. I dare say it was 
all nonsense. His heart had failed him when he found he was 
followed, and he had contrived by the help of some fellow-ser- 
vant to restore it. But there are very queer stories about old 
weapons — swords in particular. I must go now,” he concluded, 
“ for we have company to-night, and I have a good many things 
to see to.” 

So saying he left me. I remained a long time in the armory, 
and then returned to the library, where I seated myself in the 
same corner as before, and went on with my reading — lost in 
pleasure. 

All at once I became aware that the light was thickening, 
and that I was very hungry. At the same moment I heard a 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 


105 


slight rustle in the room, and looked round, expecting to see 
Mrs. Wilson come to fetch me. But there stood Miss Clara — 
not now in white, however, but in a black silk frock. She had 
grown since I saw her last, and was prettier than ever. She 
started when she saw me. 

“You heref’ she exclaimed, as if we had known each other 
all our lives. “ What are you doing here ?” 

“ Reading,” I answered, and rose from the floor, replacing 
the book as I rose. “ I thought you were Mrs. Wilson come 
to fetch me.” 

“Is she coming here?” 

“Yes. She told me not to leave the library till she came 
for me.” 

“ Then I must get out of the way.” 

“Why so. Miss Clara?” I asked. 

“ I don’t mean her to know I am here. If you tell, I shall 
think you the meanest ” 

“Don’t trouble yourself to find your punishment before 
you’ve found your crime,” I said, thinking of my own pro- 
cesses of invention. What a little prig I must have been ! 

“Very well, I will trust you,” she returned, holding out her 
hand — “ I didn’t give it you to keep, though,” she added, find- 
ing that, with more of country manners than tenderness, I fear, 
I retained it in my boyish grasp. 

I felt awkward at once, and let it go. 

“ Thank you,” she said. “ Now, when do you expect Mrs. 
Wilson?” 

“I don’t know at all. She said she would fetch me for din- 
ner. There she comes, I do believe.” 

Clara turned her head like a startled forest creature that 
wants to listen but does not know in what direction, and moved 
her feet as if she were about to fly. 

“ Come back after dinner,” she said : “you had better !” and 
darting to the other side of the room, lifted a piece of hanging 
tapestry, and vanished just in time, for Mrs. Wilson’s first 
words crossed her last. 

“ My dear boy — Master Cumbermede, I should say, I am 


106 


WILFRID GUMBERMEDE. 


sorry I have not been able to get to you sooner. One thing 
after another has kept me on my legs till I’m ready to drop. 
The cook is as tiresome as cooks only can be. But come along ; 
I’ve got a mouthful of dinner for you at last, and a few 
minutes to eat my share of it with you, I hope.” 

I followed without a word, feeling a little guilty, but only 
towards Mrs. Wilson, not towards myself, if my reader will 
acknowledge the difference— for I did not feel that I ought to 
betray Miss Clara. We returned as we came ; and certainly 
whatever temper the cook might be in, there was nothing amiss 
with the dinner. Had there been, however, I was far too hun- 
gry to find fault with it. 

“Well, how have you enjoyed yourself. Master Wilfrid? 
Not very much, I’m afraid. But really I could not help it,” 
said Mrs. Wilson. 

“ I couldn’t have enjoyed myself more,” I answered. “ If 
you will allow me. I’ll go back to the library as soon as I’ve 
done my dinner.” 

“ But it’s almost dark there now.” 

“You wouldn’t mind letting me have a candle, Mrs. Wil- 
son?” 

“ A candle, child ! It would be of no use. The place 
wouldn’t light up with twenty candles.” 

“ But I don’t want it lighted up. I could read by one can- 
dle as well as by twenty.” 

“ Very well. You shall do as you like. Only be careful, for 
the old house is as dry as tinder, and if you were to set fire to 
anything, we should be all in a blaze in a moment.” 

“I will be careful, Mrs. Wilson. You may trust me. 
Indeed you may.” 

She hurried me a little over my dinner. The bell in the 
court rang h)udly. 

“ There’s some of them already. That must be the Sim- 
monses. They’re always early, and they always come to that 
gate — I suppose because they haven’t a carriage of their own, 
and don’t like to drive into the high court in a chaise from the 
George and Pudding.” 


THE HOUSE-STEWARD. 


107 


“ I’ve quite done, ma’am : may I go now ?” 

“ Wait till I get you a candle.” 

She took one from a press in the room, lighted it, led me 
once more to the library, and there left me with the fresh 
injunction not to be peeping out and getting in the way of the 
visitors. 


108 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XIIL 

THE LEADS. 

The moment Mrs. Wilson was gone, I expected to see Clara 
peep out from behind the tapestry in the corner ; but as she 
did not appear, I lifted it and looked in. There was nothing 
behind but a closet almost filled with books, not upon shelves, 
but heaped up from floor to ceiling. There had been just 
room and no more for Clara to stand between the tapestry and 
the books. It was of no use attempting to look for her — at 
least I said so to myself, for as yet the attraction of an old 
book was equal to that of a young girl. Besides, I always 
enjoyed waiting — up to a certain point. Therefore I resumed 
my place on the floor, with the Seven Champions in one hand 
and my chamber-candlestick in the other. 

I had for the moment forgotten Clara in the adventures of 
St. Andrew of Scotland, when the silking of her frock aroused 
me. She was at my side. 

“Well, you’ve had your dinner? Did she give you any 
dessert ? ” 

“ This is my dessert,” I said, holding up the book. “ It’s 
far more than ” 

“ Far more than your desert,” she pursued, “ if you prefer 
it to me.” 

“ I looked for you first,” I said defensively. 

“Where?” 

“ In the closet there.” 

“You didn’t think I was going to wait there, did you? 
Why the very spiders are hanging dead in their own webs 
in there. But here’s some dessert for you — if you’re as fond 
of apples as most boys,” she added, taking a small rosy-cheeked 
beauty from her pocket. 

I accepted it, but somehow did not quite relish being lumped 


THE LEADS. 


109 


with boys in that fashion. As I ate it, which I should have 
felt bound to do even had it been less acceptable in itself, she 
resumed — 

“Wouldn’t you like to see the company arrive ? That’s 
what I came for. I wasn’t going to ask Goody Wilson.” 

“ Yes, I should,” I answered. “ But Mrs. Wilson told me to 
keep here, and not get in their way.” 

“Oh ! I’ll take care of that. We shan’t go near them. 1 
know every corner of the place — a good deal better than Mrs. 
Wilson. Come along, Wilfrid — ^that’s your name, isn’t it ? ” 

“ Yes, it is. Am I to call you Clara ?” 

“Yes, if you are good — that is if you like. I don’t care 
what you call me. Come along.” 

I followed. She led me into the armory. A great clang 
of the bell in the paved court fell upon our ears. 

“ Make haste,” she said, and darted to the door at the foot 
of the little stair. “ Mind how you go,” she went on. “ The 
steps are very much worn. Keep your right shoulder fore- 
most.” 

I obeyed her directions, and followed her up the stair. We 
passed the door of a room over the armory, and ascended still, 
to creep out at last through a very low door on to the leads of 
the little square tower. Here we could on the one side look 
into every corner of the paved court, and on the other, across 
the roof of the hall, could see about half of the high court, 
as they called it, into which the carriages drove ; and from 
this post of vantage we watched the arrival of a good many 
parties. I thought the ladies tripping across the paved court, 
with their gay dresses lighting up the spring twilight, and 
their sweet voices rippling its almost pensive silence, suited 
the time and the place much better than the carriages dashing 
into the other court fine as they looked with their well-kept 
horses and their servants in gay liveries. The sun was down, 
and the moon was rising — near the full, but there was too 
much light in the sky to let her make much of herself yet. It 
was one of those spring evenings which you could not tell 
from an autumn one except for a certain something in the air 


no 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


appealing to an undefined sense — rather that of smell than 
any other. There were green buds and not withering leaves 
in it — ^life and not death ; and the voices of the gathering 
guests were of the season, and pleasant to the soul. Of course 
Nature did not then affect me :^o definitely as to make me give 
forms of thought to her influences. It is now first that I turn 
them into shapes and words. 

As we stood, I discovered that I had been a little mistaken 
about the position of the Hall. I saw that, although from 
some points in front it seemed to stand on an isolated rock, 
the ground rose behind it, terrace upon terrace, the upper- 
most of which terraces was crowned with rows of trees. Over 
them the moon was now gathering her strength. 

“ It is rather cold ; I think we had better go in,” said Clara, 
after we had remained there for some minutes without seeing 
any fresh arrivals. 

“Very well,” I answered. “ What shall we do? Shall you 
go home?” 

“No, certainly not. We must see a good deal more of the 
fun first.” 

“ How will you manage that ? You will go to the ball- 
room, I suppose. You can go where you please, of course.” 

“ Oh no ! Fm not grand enough to be invited. Oh, dear 
no ! At least I am not old enough.” 

“ But you will be some day.” 

“ I don’t know. Perhaps. We’ll see. Meantime we must 
make the best of it. What are you going to do ?” 

“ I shall go back to the library.” 

“ Then I’ll go with you — till the music begins ; and then 
I’ll take you where you can see a little of the dancing. It’s 
great fun.” 

“ But how will you manage that ?” 

“ You leave that to me.” 

We descended at once to the armory, where I had left my 
candle ; and thence we returned to the library. 

“ Would you like me to read to you ?” I asked. 

“ I don’t mind — if it’s anything worth hearing.” 


THE LEADS. 


Ill 


“Well, I’ll read you a bit of the book I was reading when 
you came in.” 

“ What ! that musty old book ! No, thank you. It’s enough 
to give one the horrors. The very sight of it is enough. How 
can you like such frumpy old things ?” 

“ Oh ! you mustn’t mind the look of it,” I said. “ It’s verp 
nice inside !” 

“ I know where there is a nice one,” she returned. “ Give 
me the candle.” 

I followed her to another of the rooms, where she searched 
for some time. At length— “ There it is !” she said, and put 
into my hand The Castle of Otranto. The name promised 
well. She next led the way to a lovely little bay window, 
forming almost a closet, which looked out upon the park, 
whence, without seeing the moon, we could see her light on 
the landscape, and the great deep shadows cast over the park 
from the towers of the Hall. There we sat on the broad 
window sill, and I began to read. It was delightful. Does it 
indicate loss of power, that the grown man cannot enjoy the 
book in which the boy delighted ? Or is it that the realities 
of the book, as perceived by his keener eyes, refuse to blend 
with what imagination would supply if it might ? 

No sooner, however, did the first notes of the distant violins 
enter the ear of my companion than she started to her feet. 

“ What’s the matter ?” I asked, looking up from the book. 

“ Don’t you hear the music ?” she said, half indignantly. 

“ I hear it now,” I answered ; “ but why ?” 

“Come along,” she interrupted, eagerly. “We shall just 
be in time to see them go across from the drawing-room to the 
ball-room. Come, come. Leave your candle.” 

I put down my book with some reluctance. She led me 
into the armory, and from the armory out on the gallery half- 
encompassing the great hall, which was lighted up, and full 
of servants. Opening another door in the gallery, she con- 
ducted me down a stair which led almost into the hall, bat, 
ascending again behind it, landed us in a little lobby, on one 
side of which was the drawing-room, and on the other the 


112 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


ball-room, on another level, reached by a few high semi- 
circular steps. 

“ Quick ! quick !” said Clara, and turning sharply round, 
she opened another door, disclosing a square-built stone stair- 
case. She pushed the door carefully against the wall, ran up 
a few steps, I following in some trepidation, turned abruptly 
and sat down. I did as she did, questioning nothing : I had 
committed myself to her superior knowledge. 

The quick ear of my companion had caught the first sounds 
of the tuning of the instruments, and here we were, before the 
invitation to dance, a customed observance at Moldwarp Hall, 
had begun to play. In a few minutes thereafter the door of 
the drawing-room opened ; when, pair after pair, the com- 
pany, to the number of over a hundred and fifty, I should 
guess, walked past the foot of the stair on which we were 
seated, and ascended the steps into the ball-room. The lobby 
was dimly lighted, except from the two open doors, and there 
was little danger of our being seen. 

I interrupt my narrative to mention the odd fact, that so 
fully was my mind possessed with the antiquity of the place, 
which it had been the pride of generation after generation to 
keep up, that now when I recall the scene, the guests always 
appear dressed not as they were then, but in a far more 
antique style with which after-knowledge supplied my inner 
vision ! 

Last of all came Lady Brotherton, Sir Gileses wife, a pale, 
delicate-looking woman, leaning on the arm of a tall, long- 
necked, would-be-stately, yet insignificant-looking man. She 
gave a shiver as, up the steps from the warm drawing-room, 
she came at once opposite our open door. 

“ What a draught there is here !” she said, adjusting her 
rose-colored scarf about her shoulders. “ It feels quite wintrv. 
Will you oblige me, Mr. Mollet, by shutting that door ? Sir 
Giles will not allow me to have it built up. I am sure there 
are plenty of ways to the leads besides that.” 

This door, my lady ?” asked Mr. Mollet. 

I trembled lest he should see us. 


THE LEADS. 


113 


“ Yes. Just throw it to. There’s a spring lock on it. 1 
can’t think ” 

The slam and echoing bang of the closing door cut off the 
end of the sentence. Even Clara was a little frightened, for 
her hand stole into mine for a moment before she burst out 
laughing. 

“ Hush ! hush !” I said. “ They will hear you.” 

“ I almost wish they would,” she said. “ What a goose I 
was to be frightened, and not speak ! Do you know where we 
are?” 

“ No,” I answered ; “ how should I ? Where are we ?” 

My fancy of knowing the place had vanished utterly by 
this time. All my mental charts of it had got thoroughly 
confused, and I do not believe I could have even found my 
way back to the library. 

“ Shut out on the leads,” she answered. “ Come along. 
We may as well go to meet our fate.” 

I confess to a little palpitation of the heart as she spoke, for 
I was not yet old enough to feel that Clara’s companionship 
made the doom a light one. Up the stair we went — here no 
twisting corkscrew, but a broad flight enough, with square 
turnings. At the top was a door, fastened only with a bolt 
inside — against no worse housebreakers than the winds and 
rains. When we emerged, we found ourselves in the open night. 

“ Here we are in the moon’s drawing-room !” said Clara. 

The scene was lovely. The sky was all now — the earth 
only a background or pedestal for the heavens. The river, 
far below, shone here and there in answer to the moon, while 
the meadows and fields lay as in the oblivion of sleep, and 
the wooded hills were only dark formless masses. But the 
sky was the dwelling-place of the moon, before whose radi- 
ance, penetratingly still, the stars shrunk as if they would 
hide in the flowing skirts of her garments. There was scarce 
a cloud to be seen, and the whiteness of the moon made the 
blue thin. I could hardly believe in what I saw. It was as 
if I had come awake without getting out of the dream. 

We were on the roof of the ball-room. We felt the rhyth- 
8 


114 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


mic motion of the dancing feet shake the building in time 
to the music. “ A low melodious thunder ” buried beneath — ■ 
above the eternal silence of the white moon ! 

We passed to the roof of the drawing-room. From it, 
upon one side, we could peep into the great gothic window of 
the hall which rose high above it. We could see the servants 
passing and repassing, with dishes for the supper which was 
being laid in the dining-room under the drawing-room, for the 
hall was never used for entertainment now, except on such 
great occasions as a coming of age, or an election feast, when 
all classes met. 

“We mustn’t stop here,” said Clara. “We shall get our 
deaths of cold.'^’ 

“ What shall we do then ? ” I asked. 

“There are plenty of doors,” she answered — “only Mrs. 
Wilson has a foolish fancy for keeping them all bolted. We 
must try, though.” 

Over roof after roof we went; now descending, now 
ascending a few steps ; now walking along narrow gutters, 
between battlement and sloping roof , now crossing awkward 
junctions — ^trying doors, many in tower and turret — all in 
vain! Every one was bolted on the inside. We had grown 
quite silent, for the case looked serious. 

“ This is the last door,” said Clara — “ the last we can reach. 
There are more in the towers, but they are higher up. What 
shall we do ? Except we go down a chimney, I don’t know 
what’s to be done.” 

Still her voice did not falter, and my courage did not give 
way. She stood for a few moments silent. I stood regarding 
her, as one might listen for a doubtful oracle. 

“ Yes, I’ve got it !” she said at length. “Have you a good 
head, Wilfrid ?” 

“ I don’t quite know what you mean,” I answered. 

“ Do you mind being on a narrow place, without much to 
hold by?” 

“ High up ?” I asked with a shiver. 

“Yes.” 


THE LEADS. 


115 


For a moment I did not answer. It was a special weakness 
of my physical nature, one which my imagination had in- 
creased tenfold — the absolute horror I had of such a transit 
as she was evidently about to propose. My worst dreams — 
from which I would wake with my heart going like a fire- 
engine, were of adventures of the kind. But before a woman 
how could I draw back ? I would rather lie broken at the 
bottom of the wall. And if the fear should come to the 
worst, I could at least throw myself down and end it so. 

“Well?” I said, as if I had only been waiting for her 
exposition of the case. 

“ Well ! ” she returned. “ Come along then.” 

I did go along — like a man to the gallows ; only I would 
not have turned back to save my life. But I should have 
hailed the slightest change of purpose in her, with such 
pleasure as Daniel must have felt when he found the lions 
would rather not eat him. She retraced our steps a long way 
— until we reached the niiddle of the line of building which 
divided the two courts. 

“ There !” she said, pointing to the top of the square 
tower over the entrance to the hall, from which we had 
watched the arrival of the guests ; it rose about nine feet only 
above where we now stood in the gutter — “ I Imow I left the 
door open when we came down. I did it on purpose. I hate 
Goody Wilson. Lucky, you see ! — that is if you have a head. 
And if you haven’t it’s all the same ; I have.” 

So saying, she pointed to a sort of flying buttress which 
sprung sideways, with a wide span, across the angle the tower 
made with the hall, from an embrasure of the battlement of 
the hall, to the outer corner of the tower, itself more solidly 
buttressed. I think it must have been made to resist the 
outward pressure of the roof of the hall ; but it was one of 
those puzzling points which often occur — and oftenest in 
domestic architecture — ^where additions and consequent altera- 
tions have been made from time to time. Such will occasion 
sometimes as much conjecture towards their explanation, as a 
disputed passage in Shakspeare or .^chylus. 


116 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Could she mean me to cross that hair-like bridge ? The 
mere thought was a terror. But I would not blench. Fear 
I confess — cowardice if you will ; — poltroonery, not. 

“ I see,” I answered. “ I will try. If I fall, don’t blame 
me. I will do my best.” 

“You don’t think,” she returned, “I’m going to let you go 
alone ! I should have to wait hours before you found a door 
to let me down — except indeed you went and told Goody 
Wilson, and I had rather die where I am. No, no. Come 
along. I’ll show you how.” 

With a rush and a scramble, she was up over the round 
back of the buttress before I had time to understand that she 
meant as usual to take the lead. If she could but have sent 
me back a portion of her skill, or lightness, or nerve, or 
whatever it was, just to set me off with a rush like that ! But 
I stood preparing at once and hesitating. She turned and 
looked over the battlements of the tower. 

“Never mind, Wilfrid,” she said ; “I’ll fetch you presently.” 

“ No, no ; ” I cried. “ Wait for me. I’m coming.” 

I got astride of the buttress, and painfully forced my way 
up. It was like a dream of leap-frog, prolonged under pain- 
fully recurring difficulties. I shut my eyes and persuaded 
myself that all I had to do was to go on leap-frogging. At 
length, after more trepidation and brain-turning than I care 
to dwell upon, lest even now it should bring back a too keen 
realization of itself, I reached the battlement, seizing which, 
with one shaking hand, and finding the other grasped by 
Clara, I tumbled on the leads of the tower. 

“Come along!” she said. “You see, when the girls like, 
they can beat the boys — even at their own games. We’re all 
right now.” 

“ I did my best,” I returned, mightily relieved. “ J’m not 
an angel, you know. I can’t fly like you.” 

She seemed to appreciate the compliment. 

“ Never mind. I’ve done it before. It was game of you to 
follow.” 

Her praise elated me beyond measure. And it was well. 


THE LEADS. 


117 


“ Come along,” she added. 

She seemed to be always saying Coine along, 

I obeyed, full of gratitude and relief. She skipped to the 
tiny turret which rose above our heads, and lifted the door- 
latch. But instead of disappearing within, she turned and 
looked at me in white dismay. The door was bolted. Her 
look roused what there was of manhood in me. I felt that, 
as it had now come to the last gasp, it was mine to comfort 
her. 

“We are no worse than we were,” I said. “ Never mind.” 

“I don’t know that,” she answered mysteriously. — “Can 
you go back as you came ? I can’t.” 

I looked over the edge of the battlement where I stood. 
There was the buttress crossing the angle of moonlight, with 
its shadow lying far down on the wall. I shuddered at the 
thought of renewing my unspeakable dismay. But what 
must be must. Besides, Clara had praised me for creeping 
where she could fly : now I might show her that I could 
creep where she could not fly. 

“ I will try,” returned I, putting one leg over the battle- 
ment. 

“ Do take care, Wilfrid,” she cried, stretching out her 
hands, as if to keep me from falling. 

A sudden pulse of life rushed through me. All at once I 
became not only bold, but ambitious. 

“ Give me a kiss,” I said, “ before I go.” 

“Do you make so much of it?” she returned, stepping 
back a pace — How much a woman she was even then ! — Her 
words roused something in me which to this day I have not 
been able quite to understand. A sense of wrong had its 
share in the feeling ; but what else I can hardly venture to 
say. At all events, an inroad of careless courage was the 
consequence. I stepped at once upon the buttress, and stood 
for a moment looking at her — no doubt with reproach. She 
sprang towards me. 

“ I beg your pardon,” she said. 

The end of the buttress was a foot or two below the level 


118 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


of the leads, where Clara stood. She bent over the battle- 
ment, stooped her face towards me, and kissed me on the 
mouth. My only answer was to turn and walk down the 
buttress, erect; a walk which, as the arch of the buttress 
became steeper, ended in a run and a leap on to the gutter of 
the hall. There I turned, and saw her stand like a lady in a 
ballad leaning after me in the moonlight. I lifted my cap 
and sped away, not knowing whither, but fancying that out of 
her sight I could make up my mind better. Nor was I 
mistaken. The moment I sat down, my brains began to go 
about, and in another moment I saw what might be 
attempted. 

In going from roof to roof, I had seen the little gallery 
along which I had passed with Mrs. Wilson on my way to the 
library. It crossed what might be called an open shaft in the 
building. I thought I could manage, roofed as it was, to get 
in by the open side. It was some time before I could find it 
again ; but when I did come upon it at last, I saw that it might 
be done. By the help of a projecting gargoyle, curiously 
carved in the days when the wall to which it clung formed 
part of the front of the building, I got my feet upon the 
wooden rail of the gallery, caught hold of one of the small 
pillars which supported the roof, and slewed myself in. I was 
almost as glad as when I had crossed the buttress, for below 
me was a paved bottom, between high walls, without any door, 
like a dry well in the midst of the building. 

My recollection of the way to the armory I found, however, 
almost obliterated. I knew that I must pass through a bed- 
room at the end of the gallery, and that was all I remembered. 
I opened the door, and found myself face to face with a young 
girl with wide eyes. She stood staring and astonished, but not 
frightened. She was younger than Clara, and not so pretty. 
Her eyes were dark, and so was the hair she had been brush- 
ing. Her face would have been quite pale, but for the rosy 
tinge of surprise. She made no exclamation, only stared with 
her brush in her hand, and questions in her eyes. I felt far 
enough from comfortable ; but with a great effort I spoke. 



SHE BENT OVER THE BATTLEMENT, STOOPED HER FACE 
TOWARD ME, AND KISSED ME. 


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THE LEADS. 


119 


“ I beg your pardon. I had to get off the roof, and this was 
the only way. Please do not tell Mrs. Wilson.” 

“No,” she said at once, very quietly ; “but you must go 
away.” 

“ If I could only find the library I” I said. “ I am so afraid 
of going into more rooms where I have no business.” 

“ I will show you the way,” she returned with a smile ; and 
laying down her brush, took up a candle and led me from the 
room. 

In a few moments I was safe. My conductor vanished at 
once. The glimmer of my own candle in a further room 
guided me, and I was soon at the top of the corkscrew stair- 
case. I found the door very slightly fastened : Clara must 
herself have unwittingly moved the bolt when she shut it. I 
found her standing all eagerness, waiting me. We hurried 
back to the library, and there I told her howl had effected an 
entrance, and met with a guide. 

“ It must have been little Polly Osborne,” she said. “Her 
mother is going to stay all night, I suppose. She’s a good-na- 
tured little goose, and won’t tell. — Now come along. We’ll 
have a peep from the picture-gallery into the ball-room. That 
door is sure to be open.” 

“ If you don’t mind, Clara, I would rather stay where I am. 
I oughtn’t to be wandering over the house when Mrs. Wilson 
thinks I am here.” 

“ Oh, you little coward !” said Clara. 

I thought I hardly deserved the word, and it did not make 
me more inclined to accompany her. 

“You can go alone,” I said. “You did not expect to find 
me w^hen you came.” 

“ Of course I can. Of course not. It’s quite as well, too. 
You won’t get me into any more scrapes.” 

“ Did I get you into the scrape, Clara ?” 

“Yes, you did,” she answered, laughing, and walked away. 

I felt a good deal hurt, but comforted myself by saying she 
could not mean it, and sat down again to the Seven Champions. 


120 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

THE GHOST. 

I SAW no more of Clara, but sat and read until I grew cold 
and tired, and wished very much that Mrs. Wilson would come. 
I thought she might have forgot me in the hurry, and there I 
should have to stay all night. After my recent escape, how- 
ever, from a danger so much worse, I could regard the pros- 
pect with some composure. A full hour more must have 
passed ; I was getting sleepy, and my candle had burned low, 
when at length Mrs. Wilson did make her appearance, and I 
accompanied her gladly. 

“ I am sure you want your tea, poor boy !” she said. 

“ Tea ! Mrs. Wilson,” I rejoined. “ It’s bed I want. But 
when I think of it, I am rather hungry.” 

“ You shall have tea and bed both,” she answered kindly. 
“ I’m sorry you’ve had such a dull evening, but I could not 
help it.” 

“ Indeed, I’ve not been dull at all,” I answered, “ till just 
the last hour or so.” 

I longed to tell her all I had been about, for I felt guilty; 
but I would not betray Clara. 

“Well, here we are!” she said, opening the door of her own 
room. “ I hope I shall have peace enough to see you make a 
good meal.” 

I did make a good meal. When I had done, Mrs. Wilson 
took a rush-light and led the way. I took my sword and fol- 
lowed her. Into what quarter of the house she conducted me 
I could not tell. There was a nice fire burning in the room, 
and my night-apparel was airing before it. She set the light 
on the floor, and left me with a kind good-night. I was soon 
undressed and in bed, with my sword beside me on the cover- 
lid of silk patchwork. 

But, from whatever cause, sleepy as I had been a little while 


THE GHOST. 


121 


before, I lay wide awake now, staring about the room. Like 
many others in the house, it was hung with tapestry, which 
was a good deal worn and patched — notably in one place, 
where limbs of warriors and horses came to an untimely end on 
all sides of a certain square piece quite different from the rest in 
color and design. I know now that it was a piece of GohelinSy 
in the midst of ancient needlework. It looked the brighter of 
the two, but its colors were few, with a good deal of white ; 
whereas that which surrounded it had had many and brilliant 
colors, which, faded, and dull and sombre, yet kept their har- 
mony. The guard of the rush-light cast deeper and queerer 
shadows, as the fire sank lower. Its holes gave eyes of light 
to some of the figures in the tapestry, and as the light wavered, 
the eyes wandered about in a ghostly manner, and the shadows 
changed and flickered and heaved uncomfortably. 

How long I had lain thus I do not know ; but at last I 
found myself watching the rectangular patch of newer tapes- 
try. Could it be that it moved ? It could be only the effect 
of the wavering shadows. And yet I could not convince my- 
self that it did not move. It did move. It came forward. 
One side of it did certainly come forward. A kind of uni- 
versal cramp seized me — a contraction of every fibre of my 
body. The patch opened like a door — ^wider and wider ; and 
from behind came a great helmet, peeping. I was all one 
terror, but my nerves held out so far that I lay like a watching 
dog — watching for what horror would come next. The door 
opened wider. A mailed hand and arm appeared, and at 
length a figure, armed cap-a-pie, stepped slowly down, stood 
for a moment peering about, and then began to walk through 
the room, as if searching for something. It came nearer and 
nearer to the bed. I wonder now, when I think of it, that the 
cold horror did not reach my heart. I cannot have been so 
much of a coward, surely, after all ! But I suspect that it was 
only that general paralysis prevented the extreme of terror, 
just as a man in the clutch of a wild beast is hardly aware of 
suffering. At last the figure stooped over my bed, and 
stretched out a long arm. I remember nothing more. 


122 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I woke in the gray of the morning. Could a faint have 
passed into a sleep ? or was it all a dream ? I lay for some 
time before I could recall what made me so miserable. At 
length my memory awoke, and I gazed fearful about the room. 
The white ashes of the burnt-out fire were lying in the grate ; 
the stand of the rush-light was on the floor ; the wall with its 
tapestry was just as it had been ; the cold gray light had anni- 
hilated the fancied visions : I had been dreaming, and was now 
awake. But I could not lie longer in bed. I must go out. 
The morning air would give me life ; I felt worn and weak. 
Vision or dream, the room was hateful to me. With a great 
efibrt I sat up, for I still feared to move, lest I should catch a 
glimpse of the armed figure. Terrible as it had been in the 
night, it would be more terrible now. I peered into every 
corner. Each was vacant. Then first I remembered that I 
had been reading the Castle of Otranto and the Seven Cham- 
pions of Christendom^ the night before. I jumped out of bed 
and dressed myself, growing braver and braver as the light of 
the lovely spring morning swelled in the room. Having dipped 
my head in cold water, I was myself again. I opened the lat- 
tice and looked out. The first breath of air was a denial to the 
whole thing. I laughed at myself. Earth and sky were alive 
with spring. The wind was the breath of the coming summer ; 
there were flakes of sunshine and shadow in it. Before me lay 
a green bank with a few trees on its top. It was crowded with 
primroses growing through the grass. The dew was lying all 
about, shining and sparkling in the first rays of the level sun, 
which itself I could not see. The tide of life rose in my heart 
and rushed through my limbs. I would take my sword, and 
go for a ramble through the park. I went to my bed-side, and 
stretched across to find it by the wall. It must have slipped 
down at the back of the bed. No. Where could it be? In 
a word, I searched everywhere, but my loved weapon had van- 
ished. The visions of the night returned, and for a moment I 
believed them all. The night once more closed around me, 
darkened yet more with the despair of an irreparable loss I 
rushed from the room and through a long passage, with the 


THE GHOST. 


123 


blind desire to get out. The stare of an unwashed maid, 
already busy with her pail and brush, brought me to my senses. 

“ I beg your pardon,” I said ; “ I want to get out.” 

She left her implements, led me down a stair close at hand, 
opened the door at its foot, and let me out into the high court. 
I gazed about me. It was as if I had escaped from a prison 
cell into the chamber of torture : I stood the c*entre of a multi- 
tude of windows — ^the eyes of the house all fixed upon me. 
On one side was the great gate, through which, from the roof, 
I had seen the carriages drive the night before; but it was 
closed. I remembered, however, that Sir Giles had brought 
me in by a wicket in that gate. I hastened to it. There was 
but a bolt to withdraw, and I was free. 

But all was gloomy within, and genial nature could no long- 
er enter. Glittering jewels of sunlight and dew were nothing 
but drops of water upon blades of grass. Fresh-bursting trees 
were no more than the deadest of winter-bitten branches. The 
great eastern window of the universe, gorgeous with gold and 
roses, was but the weary sun making a fuss about nothing. My 
sole relief lay in motion. I roamed, I knew not whither, nor 
how long. 

At length I found myself on a height eastward of the Hall, 
overlooking its gardens, which lay in deep terraces beneath. 
Inside a low wall was the first of them, dark with an avenue 
of ancient trees, and below was the large oriel window in the 
end of the ball-room. I climbed over the wall, which was 
built of cunningly fitted stones, with mortar only in the top 
row ; and, drawn by the gloom, strolled up and down the ave- 
nue for a long time. At length I became aware of a voice I 
had heard before. I could see no one ; but, hearkening about, 
I found it must come from the next terrace. Descending by a 
deep flight of old mossy steps, I came upon a strip of smooth 
sward, with yew-trees, dark and trim, on each side of it. At 
the end of the walk was an arbor, in which I could see the 
glimmer of something white. Too miserable to be shy, I ad- 
vanced and peeped in. The girl who had shown me the way 
to the library was talking to her mother. 


124 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Mamma !” she said, without showing any surprise, “ here 
is the boy who came into our room last night.” 

“ How do you do ?” said the lady kindly, making room for 
me on the bench beside her. 

I answered as politely as I could, and felt a strange comfort 
glide from the sweetness of her countenance. 

“W hat an adventure you had last night !” she said. “ It 
was well you did not fall.” 

“ That wouldnT have been much worse than having to stop 
where we were,” I answered. 

The conversation thus commenced went on until I had told 
them all my history, including my last adventure. 

“ You must have dreamed it,” said the lady. 

“ So I thought, ma’am,” I answered, “ until I found that my 
sword was gone.” 

** Are you sure you looked everywhere ?” she asked. 

“Indeed, I did.” 

“ It does not follow, however, that the ghost took it. It is 
more likely Mrs. Wilson came in to see you after you were 
asleep, and carried it off.” 

“Oh, yes!” I cried, rejoiced at the suggestion; “that must 
be it. I shall ask her.” 

“ I am sure you will find it so. Are you going home soon?” 

“ Yes — as soon as I’ve had my breakfast. It’s a good walk 
from here to Aldwick.” 

“So it is. — We are going that way too,” she added, think- 
ingly. 

“ Mr. Elder is a great friend of papa’s — isn’t he, mamma ?” 
said the girl. 

“Yes, my dear. They were friends at college.” 

“ I have heard Mr. Elder speak of Mr. Osborne,” I said. 
“ Do you live near us ?” 

“ Not very far off— in the next parish where my husband is 
rector,” she answered. “ If you could wait till the afternoon, 
we should be happy to take you there. The pony carriage is 
coming for us.” 

“ Thank you, ma’am,” I answered ; “ but I ought to go im- 


THE GHOST. 


125 


mediately after breakfast. You won^t mention about the roof, 
will you ? I oughtn’t to get Clara into trouble.” 

“She is a wild girl,” said Mrs. Osborne; “ but I think you 
are quite right.” 

“How lucky it was I knew the library!” said Mary, who 
had become quite friendly, from under her mother’s wing. 

“That it was! But I dare say you know all about the 
place,” I answered. 

“ No, indeed !” she returned. “ I know nothing about it. 
As we went to our room, mamma opened the door and showed 
me the library, else, I shouldn’t have been able to help you at 
all.” 

“ Then you haven’t been here often ?” 

“No; and I never shall be again. I’m going away to 
school,” she added ; and her voice trembled. 

“ So am I,” I said. “ I’m going to Switzerland in a month 
or two. But then I haven’t a mamma to leave behind me.” 

She broke down at that, and hid her head on her mother’s 
bosom. I had unawares added to her grief, for her brother 
Charley was going to Switzerland too. 

I found afterwards that Mr. Elder, having been consulted 
by Mr. Osborne, had arranged with my uncle that Charley Os- 
borne and I should go together. 

Mary Osborne — I never called her Polly as Clara did — con- 
tinued so overcome by her grief that her mother turned to me 
and said, 

“ I think you had better go. Master Cumbermede.” 

I bade her good morning, and made my way to Mrs. Wil- 
son’s apartment. I found, she had been to my room, and was 
expecting me with some anxiety, fearing I had set off without 
my breakfast. Alas ! she knew nothing about the sword, looked 
annoyed, and, I thought, rather mysterious ; said she would 
have a search, make inquiries, do what she could, and such 
like, but begged I would say nothing about it in the house. I 
left her with a suspicion that she believed the ghost had carried 
it away, and that it was of no use to go searching after it. 

Two days after, a parcel arrived for me. I concluded it was 


126 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


my sword ; but to my grievous disappointment, found it was 
only a large hamper of apples and cakes, very acceptable in 
themselves, but too plainly indicating Mrs. Wilson’s desire to 
console me for an irreparable loss. Mr. Elder never missed 
the sword. I rose high in the estimation of my schoolfellows 
because of the adventure, especially in that of Moberly, who 
did not believe in the ghost, but ineffectually tasked his poor 
brains to account for the disappearance of the weapon. The 
best light was thrown upon it by a merry boy of the name of 
Fisher, who declared his conviction that the steward had car- 
ried it off to add to his collection. 


AWAY. 


127 


CHAPTER XV. 

AWAY. 

I WILL not linger longer over this part of my history— 
already, I fear, much too extended for the patience of my 
readers. My excuse is, that in looking back, the events I 
have recorded appear large and prominent, and that certainly 
they have a close relation with my after history. 

The time arrived when I had to leave England for Switzer- 
land. I will say nothing of my leave-taking. It was not a 
bitter one. Hope was strong, and rooted in present pleasure. 
I was capable of much happiness — keenly responsive to the 
smallest agreeable impulse from without or from within. I 
had good health, and life was happiness in itself. The blow- 
ing of the wind, the shining of the sun, or the glitter of water, 
was sufficient to make me glad ; and I had self-consciousness 
enough to increase the delight by the knowledge that I was 
glad. 

The fact is I was coming in for my share in the spiritual in^ 
fluences of Nature, so largely poured on the heart and mind 
of my generation. The prophets of the new blessing, Words- 
worth and Coleridge, I knew nothing of. Keats was only 
beginning to write. I had read a little of Cowper, but did not 
care for him. Yet I was under the same spell as they all. 
Nature was a power upon me. I was filled with the vague 
recognition of a present soul in Nature — with a sense of the 
humanity everywhere difiused through her and operating 
upon ours. I was but fourteen, and had only feelings, but 
something lay at the heart of the feelings, which would one 
day blossom into thoughts. 

At the coach-office in the county-town I first met my future 
companion, with his father, who was to see us to our destina- 
tion. My uncle accompanied me no farther, and I soon found 


128 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


myself on the top of the coach, mth only one thing to do — 
make the acquaintance of Charles Osborne. His father was 
on the box-seat, and we two sat behind ; but we were both shy, 
and for some time neither spoke. Charles was about my own 
age, rather like his sister, only that his eyes were blue, and 
his hair a lightish brown. A tremulousness about the mouth 
betrayed a nervous temperament. His skin was very fair and 
thin, showing the blue veins. As he did not speak, I sat for 
a little while watching him, without, however, the least specu- 
lation concerning him, or any effort to discover his character. 
I have not even yet reached the point of trying to find people 
out. I take what time and acquaintance discloses, but never 
attempt to forestall, which may come partly from trust, partly 
from want of curiosity, partly from a disinclination to unne- 
cessary mental effort. But as I watched his face, half-uncon- 
sciously, I could not help observing that now and then it 
wonld light up suddenly and darken again almost instantly. 
At last his father turned round, and with some severity, 
said : — 

“ You do not seem to be making any approaches to mutual 
acquaintance. Charles, why don’t you address your compan- 
ion?” 

The words were uttered in the slow tone of one used to 
matters too serious for common speech. 

The boy cast a hurried glance at me, smiled uncertainly, 
and moved uneasily on his seat. His father turned away and 
made a remark to the coachman. 

Mr. Osborne was a very tall, thin, yet square-shouldered 
man, with a pale face, and large features of delicate form. 
He looked severe, pure, and irritable. The tone of his voice, 
although the words were measured and rather stilted, led me 
to this last conclusion quite as much as the expression of his 
face ; for it was thin and a little acrid. I soon observed that 
Charley started slightly, as often as his father addressed him ; 
but this might be because his father always did so with more 
or less of abruptness. At times there was great kindness in 
his manner, seeming, however, less the outcome of natural 


AWAY. 


129 


tenderness than a sense of duty. His being was evidently a 
weight upon his son’s, and kept down the natural movements 
of his spirit. A number of small circumstances only led me 
to these conclusions ; for nothing remarkable occurred to set 
in any strong light their mutual relation. For his side 
Charles was always attentive and ready, although with a 
promptitude that had more in it of the mechanical impulse of 
habit than of pleased obedience. Mr. Osborne spoke kindly 
to me — I think the more kindly that I was not his son, and he 
was therefore not so responsible for me. But he looked as if 
the care of the whole world lay on his shoulders ; as if an 
awful destruction were the most likely thing to happen to every 
one, and to him were committed the toilsome chance of saving 
some. Doubtless he would not have trusted his boy so far 
from home, but that the clergyman to whom he was about to 
hand him over was an old friend, of the same religious opin- 
ions as himself. 

I could well but must not linger over the details of our 
journey, full to me of most varied pleasure. The constant 
change, not so rapid as to prevent the mind from reposing a 
little upon the scenes which presented themselves ; the passing 
vision of countries and peoples, manners and modes of life, so 
different from our own, did much to arouse and develop my 
nature. Those flashes of pleasure came upon Charles’s pale 
face more and more frequently ; and ere the close of the first 
day we had begun to talk with some degree of friendliness. 
But it became clear to me that with his father ever blocking up 
our horizon, whether he sat with his broad back in front of us 
on the coach-box, or paced the deck of a vessel, or perched with 
us under the hood on the top of a diligence, we should never 
arrive at any freedom of speech. I sometimes wondered, long 
after, whether Mr. Osborne had begun to discover that he was 
overlaying and smothering the young life of his boy, and had 
therefore adopted the plan so little to have been expected from 
him, of sending his son to foreign parts to continue his 
education. 

I have no distinct recollection of dates, or even of the exact 
9 


130 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


season of the year. I believe it was the early summer, but in my 
memory the whole journey is now a mass of confused loveliness 
and pleasure. Not that we had the best of weather all the 
way. I well recollect pouring rains, and from the fact that 
I distinctly remember my first view of an Alpine height, I am 
certain we must have had days of mist and rain immediately 
before. That sight, however, to me more like an individual 
revelation or vision than the impact of an object upon the 
brain, stands in my mind altogether isolated from preceding 
and following impressions — alone, a thing to praise God for, 
if there be a God to praise. K there be not, then was the 
whole thing a grand and lovely illusion, worthy, for grandeur 
and loveliness, of a world with a God at the heart of it. But 
the grandeur and tlie loveliness spring from the operation of 
natural laws ; the laws themselves are real and true — how 
could the false result from them ? I hope yet and will hope 
that I am not a bubble filled with the mocking breath of a 
Mephistopheles, but a child whom his infinite Father will not 
hardly judge that he could not believe in him so much as he 
would. I will tell how the vision came. 

Although comparatively few people visited Switzerland in 
those days, Mr. Osborne had been there before, and for some 
reason or other had determined on going round by Inter- 
lachen. At Thun we found a sail-boat which we hired to take 
us and our luggage. At starting, an incident happened which 
would not be worth mentioning, but for the impression it 
made upon me : a French lady accompanied by a young girl 
approached Mr. Osborne — doubtless perceiving he was a clergy- 
man, for, being an I/vangelical of the most pure, honest and 
narrow type, he was in every point and line of his countenance 
marked a priest and apart from his fellow-men — and asked 
him to allow her and her daughter to go in the boat with us to 
Interlachen. A glow of pleasure awoke in me at sight of his 
courtly behaviour, with lifted hat and bowed head ; for I had 
never been in the company of such a gentleman before. But the 
wish instantly followed that his son might have shared in his 
courtesy. We partook freely of his justice and benevolence, 


AWAY. 


131 


but he showed us no such grace as he showed the lady. I 
have since observed that sons are endlessly grateful for 
courtesy from their fathers. 

The lady and her daughter sat down in the stern of the 
boat; and therefore Charley and I, not certainly to our dis- 
comfiture, had to go before the mast. The men rowed out into 
the lake, and then hoisted the sail. Away we went careering 
before a pleasant breeze. As yet it blew fog and mist, but the 
hope was that it would soon blow it away. 

An unspoken friendship by this time bound Charley and me 
together, silent in its beginnings and slow in its growth — not 
the worst pledges of endurance. And now, for the first time 
in our journey, Charley was hidden from his father : the sail 
came between them. He glanced at me with a slight sigh, 
which even then I took for an involuntary sigh of relief. We 
lay leaning over the bows, now looking up at the mist blown 
in never-ending volumed sheets, now at the sail swelling in the 
w^ind before which it fled, and again down at the water 
through which our boat was ploughing its effervescent furrow. 
We could see very little. Portions of the shore would now 
and then appear, dim, like reffections from a tarnished mirror, 
and then fade back into the depths of cloudy dissolution. 
Still it was growing lighter, and the man who was on the out- 
look became less anxious in his forward gaze, and less frequent 
in his calls to the helmsman. I was lying half over the gun- 
wale, looking into the strange-colored water, blue dimmed 
with undissolved white, when a cry from Charles made me 
start and look up. It was indeed a God-like vision. The mist 
yet rolled thick below, but away up, far away and far up, yet 
as if close at hand, the clouds were broken into a mighty 
window, through which looked in upon us a huge mountain 
peak, swathed in snow. One great level band of darker cloud 
crossed its breast, above which rose the peak, triumphant in 
calmness, and stood unutterably solemn and grand, in clouds 
as white as its own whiteness. It had been there all the time ! 
I sank on my knees in the boat and gazed up. With a sud- 
den sweep the clouds curtained the mighty window, and the 


132 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Jungfrau withdrew into its Holy of Holies. I am painfully 
conscious of the helplessness of my speech. The vision van- 
ishes from the words as it vanished from the bewildered eyes. 
But from the mind it glorified it has never vanished. I have 
been more ever since that sight. To have beheld a truth is an 
apotheosis. What the truth was I could not tell ; but I had 
seen something which raised me above my former self and 
made me long to rise higher yet. It awoke worship, and a 
belief in the incomprehensible divine ; but admitted of being 
analyzed no more than, in that transient vision, my intellect 
could — ere dawning it vanished — analyze it into the deserts of 
rock, the gulfs of green ice and flowing water, the savage soli- 
tudes of snow, the mysterious miles of draperied mist, that 
went to make up the vision, each and all essential thereto. 

I had been too much given to the attempted production in 
myself of effects to justify the vague theories towards which my 
inborn free possessions carried me. I had felt enough to be- 
lieve there was more to be felt ; and such stray scraps of verse 
of the new order as, floating about, had reached me, had set me 
questioning and testing my own life and perceptions and sym- 
pathies by what these awoke in me at second-hand. I had 
often doubted, oppressed by the power of these, whether I 
could myself see, or whether my sympathy with Nature was 
not merely inspired by the vision of others. Ever after this, 
if such a doubt returned, with it arose the Jungfrau, looking 
into my very soul. 

“ Oh Charley !” was all I could say. Our hands met 
blindly, and clasped each other. I burst into silent tears. 

When I looked up, Charley was staring into the mist again. 
His eyes too were full of tears, but some troubling contradic- 
tion prevented their flowing ; I saw it by the expression of 
that mobile but now firmly closed mouth. 

Often ere we left Switzerland I saw similar glories : thla 
vision remains alone, for it was the first. 

I will not linger over the tempting delight of the village 
near which we landed, its houses covered with quaintly 
notched wooden scales, like those of a fish, and its river full to 


AWAY. 


133 


the brim of white-blue water, rushing from the far-off bosom 
of the glaciers. I had never had such a sense of exuberance 
and plenty as this river gave me — especially where it 
filled the planks and piles of wood that hemmed it in like a 
trough. I might agonize in words for a day and I should not 
express the delight. A-nd, lest my readers should apprehend 
a diary of a tour, j. shall say nothing more of our journey, 
remarking only that if Switzerland were to become as com- 
mon to the mere tourist mind as Cheapside is to a Londoner, 
the meanest of its glories would be no whit impaired thereby. 
Sometimes, I confess, in these days of overcrowded cities, 
when, in periodical floods, the lonely places of the earth are 
from them inundated, I do look up to the heavens and say to 
myself that there at least, between the stars, even in thickest 
of nebulous constellations, there is yet plenty of pure, un- 
adulterated room — ^not even a vapor to hang a color upon ; 
but presently I return to my better mind and say, that any 
man who loves his fellow will yet find he has room enough 
and to spare. 


134 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTEK XVI. 

THE ICE-CAVE. 

During our journey Mr. Osborne had seldom talked to us, 
and far more seldom in speech sympathetic. If by chance I 
came out with anything I thought or felt, even if he did not 
disapprove altogether, he would yet first lay hold of some- 
thing to which he could object, coming round only by degrees, 
and with differences, to express a little consent. Evidently 
with him objection was the first step in instruction. It was 
better in his eyes to say you were wrong than to say you were 
right, even if you should be much more right than wrong. 
He had not the smallest idea of siding with the truth in you, 
of digging about it and watering it, until it grew a great tree 
in which all your thought-birds might nestle and sing their 
songs ; but he must be ever against the error — ^forgetting that 
the only antagonist of the false is the true. “ What,” I used 
to think in after years, “ is the use of battering the walls to 
get at the error, when the kindly truth is holding the postern 
open for you to enter and pitch it out of the window ?” 

The evening before we parted, he gave us a solemn admon- 
ishment on the danger of being led astray by what men called 
the beauties of Nature' — for the heart was so desperately 
wicked, that even of the things Gnd had made to show his 
power, it would make snares for our destruction. I will not 
go on with his homily, out of respect for the man; for 
there was much earnestness in him, and it would utterly 
shame me if I were supposed to hold that up to the contempt 
which the forms it took must bring upon it. Besides, he 
made such a free use of the most sacred of names, that I 
shrink from representing his utterance. A good man I do not 
doubt he was ; but he did the hard parts of his duty to the 
neglect of the genial parts, and therefore was not a man to 


THE ICE-CAVE. 


135 


help others to be good. His own son revived the moment he 
took his leave of us — ^began to open up, as the little red 
flower called the Shepherd’s Hour-Glass opens when the cloud 
withdraws. It is a terrible thing when the father is the cloud 
and not the sun of his child’s life. If Charley had been like 
the greater number of boys I have known, all this would only 
have hardened his mental and moral skin by the natural pro- 
cess of accommodation. But his skin would not harden, and 
the evil wrought the deeper. From his father he had in- 
herited a conscience of abnormal sensibility ; but he could not 
inherit the religious dogmas by means of which his father had 
partly deadened, partly distorted his : and constant pressure 
and irritation had already generated a great soreness of surface. 

When he began to open up, it was after a sad fashion at 
first. To resume my simile of the pimpernel — it was to dis- 
close a heart in which the glowing purple was blanched to a 
sickly violet. What happiness he had, came in fits and 
bursts, and passed as quickly, leaving him depressed and 
miserable. He was always either wishing to be happy, or 
trying to be sure of the grounds of the brief happiness he 
had. He allowed the natural blessedness of his years hardly 
a chance : the moment its lobes appeared above ground, he 
was handling them, examining them, and trying to pull them 
open. No wonder they crept underground again! It may 
seem hardly credible that such should be the case with a boy 
of fifteen, but I am not mistaken in my diagnosis. I will go 
a little further. Gifted with the keenest perceptions, and a 
nature unusually responsive to the feeliags of others, he was 
born to be an artist. But he was content neither with his 
own suggestions, nor with understanding those of another ; he 
must, by the force of his own will, generate his friend’s feeling 
in himself, not perceiving the thing impossible. This was one 
point at which we touched, and which went far to enable me 
to understand him. The original in him was thus constantly 
repressed, and he suffered from the natural consequences of re- 
pression. He suffered also on the physical side from a ten- 
dency to disease of the lungs inherited from his mother. 


186 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Mr. Forest’s house stood high on the Grindelwald side of 
the Wengern Alp, under a bare grassy height full of pasture 
both summer and winter. In front was a great space, half 
meadow, half common, rather poorly covered with hill- 
grasses. The rock was near the surface, and in places came 
through, when the grass was changed for lichens and mosses. 
Through this rocky meadow, now roamed, now rushed, now 
tumbled one of those Alpine streams, the very thought of 
whose ice- born plenitude makes me happy yet. Its banks 
were not abrupt but rounded gently in, and grassy down to 
the water’s brink. The larger torrents of winter wore the 
channel wide, and the sinking of the water in summer let the 
grass grow within it. But, peaceful as the place was, and 
merry with the constant rush of this busy stream, it had, even 
in the hottest summer day, a memory of the winter about it, 
a look of suppressed desolation ; for the only trees upon it 
were a score of straggling pines— all dead, as if blasted by 
lightning or smothered by snow. Perhaps they were the last 
of the forest in that part, and their roots had reached a 
stratum where they could not live. All I know is, that there 
they stood, blasted and dead every one of them. 

Charley could never bear them, and even disliked the place 
because of them. His father was one whom a mote in his 
brother’s eye repelled ; the son suffered for this in twenty ways, 
one of which was, that a single spot in the landscape was to 
him enough to destroy the loveliness of exquisite surroundings. 

A good way below lay the valley of the Grindelwald. The 
Eiger and the Matterhorn were both within sight. If a man 
has any sense of the infinite, he cannot fail to be rendered 
capable of higher things by such embodiments of the high. 
Otherwise, they are heaps of dirt, to be scrambled up and 
conquered, for scrambling and conquering’s sake. They are 
but warts, Pelion and Ossa and all of them. They seemed to 
oppress Charley at first. 

“Oh Willie,” he said to me one day, “if I could but be- 
lieve in those mountains, how happy I should be! But I 
doubt, I doubt they are but rocks and snow.” 


THE ICE-CAVE. 137 

I only half understood him. I am afraid I never did 
understand him more than half. Later, I came to the con- 
clusion that this was not the fit place for him ; and that if his 
father had understood him, he would never have sent him 
there. 

It Was some time before Mr. Forest would take us any moun- 
tain ramble. He said we must first get accustomed to the air 
of the place, else the precipices would turn our brains. He 
allowed us, however, to range within certain bounds. 

One day soon after our arrival, we accompanied one of our 
schoolfellows down to the valley of the Grindelwald, specially 
to see the head of the snake-glacier, which having crept thither 
can creep no further. Somebody had even then hollowed out 
a cave in it. We crossed a little brook which issued from it 
constantly, and entered. Charley uttered a cry of dismay, but 
I was too much delighted at the moment to heed him. For 
the whole of the white cavern was filled with blue air, so blue 
that 1 saw the air which filled it. Perfectly transparent, it 
had no substance, only blueness, which deepened and deepened 
as I went further in. All down the smooth white walls ever- 
more was stealing a thin veil of dissolution ; while here and 
there little runnels of the purest water were tumbling in tiny 
cataracts from top to bottom. It was one of the thousand 
birthplaces of streams, ever creeping into the day of vision 
from the unlike and the unknown, unrolling themselves like 
the fronds of a fern out of the infinite of God. Ice was all 
around, hard and cold and dead and white ; but out of it and 
away went the water babbling and singing in the sunlight. 

“ O Charley !” I exclaimed, looking round in my transport 
for sympathy. It was now my turn to cry out, for Charley’s 
face was that of a corpse. The brilliant blue of the cave 
made us look to each other most ghastly and fearful. 

“ Do come out, Wilfrid,” he said ; I cannot bear it.” 

I put my arm in his, and we walked into the sunlight. He 
drew a deep breath of relief, and turned to me with an attempt 
at a smile, but his lip quivered. 

“ It’s an awfiil place, Wilfrid. I don’t like it. Don’t go in 


138 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


again. I should stand waiting to see you come out in a wind* 
ing sheet. I think there is something wrong with my brain. 
That blue seems to have got into it. I see everything horribly 
dead.” 

On the way back he started several times, and looked round 
as if with involuntary apprehension, but mastered himself with 
an effort, and joined again in the conversation. Before we 
reached home he was much fatigued, and complaining of 
headache, went to bed immediately on our arrival. 

We slept in the same room. When I went up at the usual 
hour, he was awake. 

“ CanT you sleep, Charley ?” I said. 

“I’ve been asleep several times,” he answered, “but IVe had 
such a horrible dream every time! We were all corpses that 
couldn’t get to sleep, and went about pawing the slimy walls 
of our marble sepulchre — so cold and wet! It was that hor- 
rible ice-cave, I suppose. But then you know that’s just what 
it is, Wilfrid.” 

“ I don’t know what you mean,” I said, instinctively turning 
from the subject, for the glitter of his black eyes looked bode- 
ful. I did not then know how like he and I were, or how 
like my fate might have been to his, if, instead of finding at 
once a fit food for my fancy, and a safety-valve for its excess, 
in those old romances, I had had my regards turned inwards 
upon myself, before I could understand the phenomena there 
exhibited. Certainly I too should have been thus rendered 
miserable, and body and soul would have mutually preyed on 
each other. 

I sought to change the subject. I could never talk to him 
about his father, but he had always been ready to speak of his 
mother and sister. Now, however, I could not rouse him. 
“Poor mamma!” was all the response he made to some admir- 
ing remark ; and when I mentioned his sister Mary, he only 
said, “She’s a good girl, our Mary,” and turned uneasily to- 
wards the wall. I went to bed. He lay quiet, and I fell 
asleep. 

When I woke in the morning, I found him very unwell. I 


THE ICE-CAVE. 


139 


suppose the illness had been coining on for some time. He was 
in a low fever. As the doctor declared it not infectious, I was 
allowed to nurse him. He was often delirious and spoke the 
wildest things. Especially, he would converse with the Saviour 
after the strangest fashion. 

He lay ill for some weeks. Mr. Forest would not allow me 
to sit up with him at night, but I was always by his bedside 
early in the morning, and did what I could to amuse and com- 
fort him through the day. When at length he began to grow 
better, he was more cheerful than I had known him hitherto; 
but he remained very weak for some time. He had grown a 
good deal during his illness, and indeed never looked a boy 
again. 


140 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XVII. 

AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 

One summer morning we all got up very early, except Char- 
ley, who was unfit for the exertion, to have a ramble in the 
mountains, and see the sun rise. The fresh, friendly air, full 
of promise, greeting us the moment we crossed the threshold ; 
the calm light which without visible source lay dream-like on 
the hills ; the brighter space in the sky whence ere long the 
spring of glory would burst forth triumphant ; the dull white 
of the snow-peaks, dwelling so awful and lonely in the mid 
heavens, as if nothing should ever comfort them or make 
them acknowledge the valleys below ; the sense of adventure 
with which we climbed the nearer heights, as familiar to our 
feet on ordinary days as the stairs to our bedrooms ; the gradual 
disappearance of the known regions behind us, and the dawn- 
ing sense of the illimitable and awful, folding in its bosom the 
homely and familiar — combined to produce an impression 
which has never faded. The sun rose in splendor, as if 
nothing more should hide in the darkness forever ; and yet with 
the light came a fresh sense of mystery, for now that which 
had appeared smooth was all broken and mottled with shadows 
innumerable. Again and again I found myself standing still 
to gaze in a rapture of delight which I can only recall, not 
express ; again and again was I roused by the voice of the mas- 
ter in front, shouting to me to come on, and warning me of the 
danger of losing sight of the rest of the company ; and again 
and again I obeyed, but without any perception of the peril. 

The intention was to cross the hills into the valley of the 
Lauterbrunnen, not however by the path now so well knowoj 
but by another way, hardly a path, with which the master and 
some of the boys were familiar enough. It was my first expe- 


AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 


141 


rience of anything like real climbing. As we passed rapidly 
over a moorland space, broken with huge knolls and solitary 
rocks, something hurt my foot, and taking off my shoe, I found 
that a small chiropodical operation was necessary, which in- 
volved the use of my knife. It slipped, and cut my foot, and 
I bound the wound with a strip from my pocket-handkerchief. 
When I got up, I found that my companions had disappeared. 
This gave me little trouble at the moment, for I had no doubt 
of speedily overtaking them; and I set out briskly in the 
direction, as I supposed, in which we had been going. But I 
presume that instead of following them, I began at once to in- 
crease the distance between us. At all events, I had not gone 
far before a pang of fear shot through me — the first awaking 
doubt. I called louder — and louder yet ; but there was no 
response, and I knew I was alone. 

Invaded by sudden despair, I sat down, and for a moment 
did not even think. All at once I became aware of the abysses 
which surrounded the throne of my isolation. Behind me the 
broken ground rose to an unseen height, and before me it 
sloped gently downwards, without a break to the eye, yet I felt 
as if, should I make one wavering movement, I must fall down 
one of the frightful precipices which Mr. Forest had told me, 
as a warning, lay all about us. I actually clung to the stone 
upon which I sat, although I could not have been in more ab- 
solute safety for the moment had I been dreaming in bed. The 
old fear had returned upon me, with a tenfold feeling of reality 
behind it. I presume it is so all through life: it is not what is, 
but what may be, that oftenest blanches the cheek and para- 
lyzes the limbs ; and oftenest gives rise to that sense of the need 
of a God which we are told nowadays is a superstition, and 
which he whom we call the Saviour acknowledged and justified 
in telling us to take no thought for the morrow, inasmuch as 
God took thought for it. I strove to master my dismay, and 
forced myself to get up and run about; and in a few minutes 
the fear had withdra\vn into the background, and I felt no long- 
er an unseen force dragging me towards a frightful gulf. But 
it was replaced by a more spiritual horror. The sense of lone« 


142 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


liness seized upon me, and the first sense of absolute loneliness 
is awful. Independent as a man may fancy himself in the 
heart of a world of men, he has only to be convinced that 
there is neither voice nor hearing, to know that the face from 
which he most recoils is of a kind essential to his very soul. 
Space is not room; and when we complain of the overcrowd- 
ing of our fellows, we are thankless for that which comforts us 
the most, and desire its absence in ignorance of our deepest 
nature. 

Not even a bird broke the silence. It lay upon my soul as the 
sky and the sea lay upon the weary eye of the ancient mariner. 
It is useless to attempt to convey the impression of my misery. 
It was not yet the fear of death, or of hunger or thirst, for I 
had as yet no adequate idea of the vast lonelinesses that lie in 
a mountain land : it was simply the being alone, with no ear 
to hear and no voice to answer me — a torture to which the 
soul is liable in virtue of the fact that it was not made to be 
alone, yea, I think, I hope, never can be alone ; for that which 
could be fact could not be such horror. Essential horror 
springs from an idea repugnant to the nature of the thinker, 
and which therefore in reality could not be. 

My agony rose and rose with every moment of silence. But 
when it reached its height, and when, to save myself from 
bursting into tears, I threw myself on the ground, and began 
gnawing at the plants about me — then first came help : I had 
a certain experience, as the Puritans might have called it. I 
fear to build any definite conclusion upon it, from the dread 
of fanaticism and the danger of attributing a merely physical 
effect to a spiritual cause. But are matter and spirit so far 
asunder? It is my will moves my arm, whatever first moves 
my will. Besides, I do not understand how, except another 
infiuence came into operation, the extreme of misery and 
depression should work round into such a change as I have 
to record. 

But I do not know how to describe the change. The silence 
was crushing, or rather sucking my life out of me — up into 
its own empty gulfs. The horror of the great stillness was 


AMONG THE MOUNTAINS, 


143 


growing deathly, when all at once I rose to my feet with a 
sense of power and confidence I had never had before. It was 
as if something divine within me awoke to outface the desola- 
tion. I felt that it was time to act, and that I could act. 
There is no cure for terror like action : in a few moments I 
could have approached the verge of any precipice — at least with- 
out abject fear. The silence — ^no longer a horrible vacancy — 
appeared to tremble with unuttered thinkings. The manhood 
within me was alive and awake. I could not recognize a single 
landmark, or discover the least vestige of a path. I knew 
upon which hand the sun was when we started ; and took my 
way with the sun on the other side. But a cloud had already 
come over him. 

I had not gone far before I saw in front of me, on the other 
side of a little hillock, something like the pale blue gray fog 
that broods over a mountain lake. I ascended the hillock, 
and started back with a cry of dismay: I was on the very 
verge of an awful gulf. When I think of it, I marvel yet 
that I did not lose my self-possession altogether. I only turned 
and strode in the other direction — ^the faster for the fear. But 
I dared not run, for I was haunted by precipices. Over 
every height, every mound, one might be lying — a trap for my 
destruction. I no longer looked out in the hope of recogni- 
zing some feature of the country ; I could only regard the 
ground before me, lest at any step I , might come upon an 
abyss. 

I had not walked far before the air began to gxow dark. I 
glanced again at the sun. The clouds had gathered thick 
about him. Suddenly a mountain wind blew cold in my face. 

I never yet can read that sonnet of Shakspeare’s — 

“ Full many a glorious morning have I seen 
Flatter the mountain tops with sovereign eye. 

Kissing with golden face the meadows green, 

Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy j 
Anon permit the basest clouds to ride 
With ugly rack on his celestial face. 

And from the forlorn world his visage hide, 

Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace,” — 


144 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


without recalling the gladness when I started from home, and 
the misery that so soon followed. But my new spirits did not 
yet give way. I trudged on. The wind increased, and in it 
came by and by the trailing skirts of a cloud. In a few mo- 
ments more I was wrapped in a mist. It was as if the gulf 
from which I had just escaped had sent up its indwelling 
demon of fog to follow and overtake me. I dared hardly go 
on even with the greatest circumspection. As I grew colder, 
my courage declined. The mist wetted my face and sank 
through my clothes, and I began to feel very wretched. I sat 
down, not merely from dread of the precipices, but to reserve 
my walking powers when the mist should withdraw. I began 
to shiver, and was getting utterly hopeless and miserable when 
the fog lifted a little, and I saw what seemed a great rock near 
me. I crept towards it. Almost suddenly it dwindled, and 
I found but a stone, yet one large enough to afford me some 
shelter. I went to the leeward side of it, and nestled at its 
foot. The mist again sank and the wind blew stronger, but I 
was in comparative comfort, partly because my imagination 
was wearied. I fell fast asleep. 

I awoke stiff with cold. Rain was falling in torrents, and 
I was wet to the skin ; but the mist was much thinner, and I 
could see a good way. For a while I was very heartless, what 
with the stiffness, and the fear of having to spend the night on 
the mountains. I was hungry too, not with the appetite of 
desire but of need. The worst was that I had no idea in what 
direction I ought to go. Downwards lay precipices — upwards 
lay the surer loneliness. I knelt and prayed the God who 
dwelt in the silence to help me ; then strode away I knew not 
whither — ^up the hill, in the faint hope of discovering some 
sign to direct me. As I climbed, the hill rose. When I sur- 
mounted what had seemed the highest point, away beyond 
rose another. But the slopes were not over steep, and I was 
able to get on pretty fast. The wind being behind me, I 
hoped for some shelter over the highest brow, but that, for 
anything I knew, might be miles away in the regions of ice 
and snow. 


AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 


145 


I had been walking I should think about an hour when the 
mist broke away from around me, and the sun, in the midst 
of clouds of dull orange and gold, shone out upon the wet 
hill. It was like a promise of safety, and woke in me courage 
to climb the steep and crumbling slope which now lay before 
me. But the fear returned. People had died in the moun- 
tains of hunger, and I began to make up my mind to meet the 
worst. I had not learned that the approach of any fate is just 
the preparation for that fate. I troubled myself with the care 
of that which was not impending over me. I tried to con- 
template the death-struggle with equanimity, but could not. 
Had I been wearier and fainter, it would have appeared less 
dreadful. Then, in the horror of the slow death of hunger, 
strange as it may appear, that which had been the special 
horror of my childish dreams returned upon me changed into 
a thought of comfort : I could, ere my strength failed me 
utterly, seek the verge of a precipice, lie down there, and 
when the suffering grew strong enough to give me courage, 
roll myself over the edge, and cut short the agony. 

At length I gained the brow of the height, and at last the 
ground sank beyond. There was no precipice to terrify, only 
a somewhat steep descent into a valley large and wide. But 
what a vision arose on the opposite side of that valley ! — an 
upright wilderness of rocks, slopes, precipices, snow, glaciers, 
avalanches ? Weary and faint as I was, I was filled with a 
glorious awe, the terror of which was the opposite of fear, for 
it lifted instead of debasing the soul. Not a pine-tree softened 
the haggard waste; not a single stray sheep of the wind’s fiock 
drew one trail of its thin-drawn wool behind it ; all was hard 
and bare. The glaciers lay like the skins of cruel beasts, 
with the green veins yet visible, nailed to the rocks to harden 
in the sun; and the little streams which ran down from their 
claws looked like the knife-blades they are, keen and hard and 
shining, sawing away at the bones of the old mountains. But 
although the mountain looked so silent, there came from it 
every now and then a thundering sound. At first I could not 
think what it was ; but gazing at its surface more steadily, 
10 


146 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


upon the face of a slope, I caught sight of what seemed a 
larger stream than any of the rest ; but it soon ceased, and 
then came the slow thunder of its fall : it was a stream, but 
a solid one — an avalanche. Away up in the air the huge 
snow-summit glittered in the light of the afternoon sun. I 
was gazing on the Maiden in one of her most savage moods — 
or, to speak prose, I was regarding one of the wildest aspects 
of the many-sided Jungfrau. 

Half way down the hill, almost right under my feet, rose a 
slender column of smoke, I could not see whence. I hastened 
towards it, feeling as strong as when I started in the morning. 
I zig-zagged down the slope, for it was steep and slippery with 
grass, and arrived at length at a good-sized cottage, which 
faced the Jungfrau. It was built of great logs laid hori- 
zontally one above the other, all with notches half through 
near the end, by which notches, lying into each other, the 
sides of the house were held together at the corners. I soon 
saw it must be a sort of roadside inn. There was no one 
about the place; but passing through a dark vestibule, in 
which were stores of fodder and various utensils, I came to a 
room in which sat a mother and her daughter — the former 
spinning, the latter making lace on a pillow. In at the win- 
dows looked the great Jungfrau. The room was lined with 
planks ; the floor was boarded ; the ceiling too was of boards 
— ^pine-wood all around. 

The women rose when I entered. I knew enough of Ger- 
man to make them understand my story, and had learned 
enough of their patois to understand them a little in return. 
They looked concerned, and the older woman, passing her 
hands over my jacket, turned to her daughter and commenced 
a talk much too rapid and no doubt idiomatic for me to fol- 
low. It was in the end mingled with much laughter, evi- 
dently at some proposal of the mother. Then the daughter 
left the room, and the mother began to heap wood on the fire. 
In a few minutes the daughter returned, still laughing, with 
some garments, which the mother took from her. I was 
watching everything from a corner of the hearth, where I had 


AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 


147 


seated myself wearily. The mother came up to me, and 
without speaking, put something over my head, which I found 
to be a short petticoat such as the women wore ; then told me 
I must take off my clothes and have them dried at the fire. 
She laid other garments on a chair beside me. 

“ I don’t know how to put them on,” I objected. 

“ Put on as many as you can,” she said laughing — and I 
will help you with the rest.” 

I looked about. There was a great press in the room. I 
went behind it and pulled off my clothes; and having 
managed to put on some of the girl’s garments, issued from 
my concealment. The kindly laughter was renewed, and 
mother and daughter busied themselves in arranging my ap- 
parel, evidently seeking to make the best of me as a girl, an 
attempt favored by my pale face. When I seemed to myself 
completely arrayed, the girl said to her mother what I took to 
mean “Let us finish what we have begun;” and leaving the 
room, returned presently with the velvet collar embroidered 
with silver and the pendent chains which the women of most 
of the cantons wear, and put it on me, hooking the chains and 
leaving them festooned under my arms. The mother was 
spreading out my clothes before the fire to dry. 

Neither was pretty, but both looked womanly and good. 
The daughter had the attraction of youth and bright eyes ; 
the mother, of good-will and experience; but both were 
sallow, and the mother very wrinkled for what seemed her 
years. 

“ Now,” I said, summoning my German, “ you’ve not yet 
finished your work. Make my short hair as like your long 
hair as you can, and then I shall be a Swiss girl.” 

I was but a boy, and had no scruple concerning a bit of 
fun of which I might have been ashamed a few years later. 
The girl took a comb from her own hair and arranged mine. 
When she had finished, 

“ One girl may kiss another,” I said ; and doubtless she un- 
derstood me, for she returned my kiss with a fresh laugh. I 
sat down by the fire, and as its warmth crept into my limbs, I 


148 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


rejoiced over comforts which yesterday had been a matter of 
course. 

Meantime they were busy getting me something to eat. 
Just as they were setting it on the table, however, a loud call 
outside took them both away. In a few moments two other 
guests entered, and then first I found myself ashamed of my 
costume. With them the mother re-entered, calling behind 
her, “ There’s nobody at home ; you must put the horses up 
yourself, Annel.” Then she moved the little table towards 
me, and proceeded to set out the meal. 

“ Ah ! I see you have got something to eat,” said one of the 
strangers, in a voice I fancied I had heard before. 

“Will you please to share it?” returned the woman, moving 
the table again towards the middle of the room. 

I thought with myself that, if I kept silent, no one could 
tell I was not a girl ; and, the table being finally adjusted, I 
moved my seat towards it. Meantime the man was helping 
his companion to take oflP her outer garments, and put them 
before the fire. I saw the face of neither until they ap- 
proached the table and sat down. Great was my surprise to 
discover that the man was the same I had met in the wood on 
ray way to Moldwarp Hall, and that the girl was Clara — a 
good deal grown — in fact looking almost a woman. From 
after facts, the meeting became less marvellous in my eyes 
than it then appeared. 

I felt myself in an awkward position — ^indeed I felt almost 
guilty, although any notion of having the advantage of them 
never entered my head. I was more than half inclined to 
run out and help Annel with the horses, but I was very 
hungry, and not at all willing to postpone my meal, simple as 
it was — bread and butter, eggs, cheese, milk, and a bottle of 
the stronger wine of the country, tasting like a coarse sherry. 
The two — father and daughter, evidently — talked about their 
journey, and hoped they should reach the Grindelwald 
without more rain. 

“ By the way,” said the gentleman, “ it’s somewhere not far 
from here young Cumbermed# is at school. I knew Mr. 


AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 149 

Forest well enough — used to know him, at least. We may as 
well call upon him.” 

“ Cumbermede ” — said Clara ; “ who is he ?” 

“ A nephew of Mrs. Wilson’s — no, not nephew — second or 
third cousin — or something of the sort, I believe. Didn’t 
somebody tell me you met him at the Hall one day ?” 

“ Oh, that boy — Wilfrid. Yes ; I told you myself. Don’t 
you remember what a bit of fun we had the night of the ball ? 
We were shut out on the leads, you know.” 

‘‘Yes, to be sure, you did tell me. What sort of a boy is he?” 

“ Oh ! I don’t know. Much like other boys. I did think 
he was a coward at first, but he showed some pluck at last. I 
shouldn’t wonder if he turns out a good sort of fellow. We 
were in a fix.” 

“You’re a terrible madcap, Clara! If you don’t settle down 
as you grow, you’ll be getting yourself into worse scrapes.” 

“Not with you to look after me, papa dear,” answered 
Clara, smiling. “It was the fim of cheating old Goody 
Wilson, you know!” 

Her father grinned with his whole mouthful of teeth, and 
looked at her with amusement — almost sympathetic roguery, 
which she evidently appreciated, for she laughed heartily. 

Meantime I was feeling very uncomfortable. Something 
within told me I had no right to overhear remarks about 
myself; and, in my slow way, I was meditating how to get 
out of the scrape. 

“What a nice-looking girl that is!” said Clara, without 
lifting her eyes from her plate — “ I mean for a Swiss, you 
know. But I do like the dress. I wish you would buy me a 
collar and chains like those, papa.” 

“ Always wanting to get something out of your old dad, 
Clara ! Just like the rest of you ! — always wanting something 
—eh?” 

“ No, papa ; it’s you gentlemen always want to keep every- 
thing for yourselves. We only want you to share.” 

“Well, you shall have the collar, and I shall have the 
chains. Will that do ?” 


150 


WILFEID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Yes, thank you, papa,” she returned, nodding her head. 
“ Meantime, hadn’t you better give me your diamond pin ? It 
would fasten this troublesome collar so nicely !” 

“ There, child !” he answered, proceeding to take it from his 
shirt. “ Anything else ?” 

“ No, no, papa dear. I didn’t want it. I expected you, 
like everybody else, to decline carrying out your professed 
principles.” 

“ What a nice girl she is,” I thought, “ after all !” 

“ My love,” said her father, “ you will know some day that 
I would do more for you even than give you my pet diamond. 
If you are a good girl, and do as I tell you, there will be 
grander things than diamond pins in store for you. But you 
may have this if you like.” 

He looked fondly at her as he spoke. 

“ Oh, no, papa! — not now at least. I should not know what 
to do with it. I should be sure to lose it.” 

If my clothes had been dry, I would have slipped away, put 
them on, and appeared in my proper guise. As it was, I was 
getting more and more miserable — ashamed of revealing who 
I was, and ashamed of hearing what the speakers supposed I 
did not understand. I sat on irresolute. In a little while, 
however, either the wine having got into my head, or the food 
and warmth having restored my courage, I began to contem- 
plate the bolder stroke of suddenly revealing myself by some 
unexpected remark. They went on talking about the country, 
and the road they had come. 

“ But we have hardly seen anything worth calling a preci- 
pice,” said Clara. 

“You’ll see hundreds of them if you look out of the win- 
dow,” said her father. 

“ Oh ! but I don’t mean that,” she returned. “ It’s nothing 
to look at them like that. I mean from the top of them — to 
look down you know.” 

“Like from the flying buttress at Moldwarp Hall, Clara?” 
I said. 

The moment I began to speak, they began to stare. Clara’s 


AMOJ^G THE MOUNTAINS. 


151 


hand was arrested on its way towards the bread, and her 
father’s wine glass hung suspended between the table and his 
lips. I laughed. 

** By J ove ! ” said Mr. Coningham — and added nothing, for 
amazement, but looked uneasily at his daughter, as if asking 
whether they had not said something awkward about me. 

“ It’s Wilfrid I ” exclaimed Clara, in the tone of one talking 
in her sleep. Then she laid down her knife and laughed aloud. 

“ What a guy you are ! ” she exclaimed. 

“ Who would have thought of finding you in a Swiss girl ? 
Really, it was too bad of you to sit there and let us go on as 
we did. I do believe we were talking about your precious 
self I At least papa was.” 

Again her merry laugh rang out She could not have taken 
a better way of relieving us. 

“ I’m very sorry,” I said ; “ but I felt so awkward in this 
costume that I couldn’t bring myself to speak before. I tried 
very hard.” 

“ Poor boy ! ” she returned, rather more mockingly than 
I liked, her violets swimming in the dews of laughter. 

By this time Mr. Coningham had apparently recovered his 
self-possession. I say apparently, for I doubt if he had ever 
lost it. He had only, I think, been running over their talk 
in his mind to see if he had said anything unpleasant, and 
now, reassured, he stretched his hand across the table. 

“ I’m sure, Mr. Cumbermede,” he interposed, “ We owe you 
an apology rather. I am sure we can’t have said anything 
we should mind you hearing ; but ” 

“ Oh ! ” I interrupted, “ You have told me nothing I did 
not know already, except that Mrs. Wilson was a relation, of 
which I was quite ignorant.” 

“ It is true enough though.” 

“ What relation is she, then ?” 

“ I think, when I gather my recollections of the matter-^ 
I think she was first cousm to your mother — ^perhaps it w^ 
only second cousin.” 

“ Why shouldn’t she have told me so, then ? 


152 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


She must explain that herself. I cannot account for that. 
It is very extraordinary.” 

“ But how do you know so well about me sir, if you don’t 
mind saying?” 

“ Oh ! I am an old friend of the family. I knew your 
father better than your uncle, though. Your uncle is not over 
friendly, you see.” 

“ I am sorry for that.” 

“ No occasion at all. I suppose he doesn’t like me. I fancy, 
being a Methodist ” 

“ My uncle is not a Methodist, I assure you. He goes to 
the parish church regularly. 

“ Oh ! it’s all one. I only meant to say that being a man 
of somewhat peculiar notions, I suppose he did not approve of 
my profession. Your good people are just as ready, however, 
to call in the lawyer as others when they fancy their rights 
invaded. Ha ! ha ! But no one has a right to complain of 
another, because he doesn’t choose to like him. Besides, it 
brings grist to the mill. If everybody liked everybody, what 
would become of the lawsuits ? And that would unsuit us — 
wouldn’t it, Clara ? ” 

“ You know, papa dear, what mamma would say ? ” 

“ But she ain’t here you know.” 

‘‘ But I am, papa ; and I don’t like to hear you talk shop,” 
said Clara, coaxingly. 

“ Very well ; we won’t, then. But I was only explaining to Mr. 
Cumbermede how I supposed it was that his uncle did not like 
me. There was no offence in that, I hope, Mr. Cumbermede ?” 

Certainly not,” I answered. “ I am the only offender. 
But I was innocent enough so far as intention goes. I came 
in drenched and cold, and the good people here amused them- 
selves dressing me like a girl. It is quite time I were getting 
home now. Mr. Forest will be in a way about me. So will 
Charley Osborne.” 

“ Oh, yes,” said Mr. Coningham, “ I remember hearing 
you were at school together somewhere in this quarter. But 
tell us all about it. Did you lose your way ?” 


AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 


153 


I told them my story. Even Clara looked grave when I 
came to the incident of finding myself on the verge of the 
precipice. 

“ Thank God, my boy !” said Mr. Coningham, kindly. 
“ You have had a narrow escape. I lost myself once in the 
Cumberland hills, and hardly got off with my life. Here it 
is a chance you were ever seen again, alive or dead. I 
wonder you’re not knocked up.” 

I was, however, more so than I knew. 

“ How are you going to get home ?” he asked. 

I don’t know any way but walking,” I answered. 

“ Are you far from home ?” 

“ I don’t know. I dare say the people here will be able to 
tell me. But I think you said you were going down into the 
Grindelwald. I shall know where I am there. Perhaps you 
will let me walk with you. Horses can’t go very fe,st along 
these roads.” 

“ You shall have my horse, my boy.” 

“No. I couldn’t think of that.” 

“ You must. I haven’t been wandering all day like you. 
You can ride, I suppose ?” 

“Yes, pretty well.” 

“ Then you shall ride with Clara, and I’ll walk with the 
guide. I shall go and see after the horses presently.” 

It was indeed a delightful close to a dreadful day. We sat 
and chatted a while, and then Clara and I went out to look 
at the Jungfrau. She told me they had left her mother at 
Interlaken, and had been wandering about the Bernese Alps 
for nearly a week. 

“ I can’t think what should have put it in papa’s head,” she 
added ; “ for he does not care much for scenery. I fancy he 
wants to make the most of poor me, and so takes me the 
grand tour. He w^anted to come without mamma, but she 
said we were not to be trusted alone. She had to give in 
when we took to horseback, though.*” 

It was getting late, and Mr. Coningham came out to find us. 

“ It is quite time we were going,” he said. “ In fact we are 


154 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


too late now. The horses are ready, and your clothes are 
dry, Mr. Cumbermede. I have felt them all over.” 

“ How kind of you, sir !” I said. 

** Nonsense. Why should any one want another to get his 
death of cold ? If you are to keep alive, it’s better to keep 
well as long as ever you can. Make haste, though, and 
change your clothes.” 

I hurried away, followed by Clara’s merry laugh at my 
clumsy gait. In a few moments I was ready. Mr. Coning- 
ham had settled my bill for me. Mother and daughter gave 
me a kind farewell, and I exhausted my German in vain 
attempts to let them know how grateful I was for their good- 
ness. There was not much time, however, to spend even on 
gratitude. The sun was nearly down, and I could see Clara 
mounted and waiting for me before the window. I found 
Mr. Coningham rather impatient. 

“ Come along, Mr. Cumbermede ; we must be off,” he said. 
** Get up there.” 

“You have grown, though, after all,” said Clara. “I 
thought it might be only the petticoats that made you look 
so tall.” 

I got on the horse which the guide, a half-witted fellow 
from the next valley, was holding for me, and we set out. 
The guide walked beside my horse, and Mr. Coningham 
beside Clara’s. The road was level for a little way, but it 
soon turned up on the hill where I had been wandering, and 
went along the steep side of it. 

“ Will this do for a precipice, Clara ?” said her father. 

“ Oh dear ! no,” she answered ; “ it’s not worth the name. 
It actually slopes outward.” 

Before we got down to the next level stretch it began again 
to rain. A mist came on, and we could see but a little way 
before us. Through the mist came the sound of the bells of 
the cattle upon the hill. Our guide trudged carefully but 
boldly on. He seemed to know every step of the way. 
Clara was very cool, her father a little anxious, and very 
attentive to his daughter, who received his help with a never- 


AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 


155 


failing merry gratitude, making light of all annoyances. At 
length we came down upon the better road, and traveled on 
with more comfort. 

Look, Clara !” I said — “ will that do ?” 

“ What is it ?” she asked, turning her head in the direction 
in which I pointed. 

On our right, through the veil, half of rain, half of gauzy 
mist, which filled the air, arose a precipice indeed — the whole 
bulk it was of the Eiger mountain, which the mist brought so 
near that it seemed literally to overhang the road. Clara 
looked up for a moment, but betrayed no sign of awe. 

“ Yes, I think that will do,” she said. 

“ Though you are only at the foot of it?” I suggested. 

“ Yes ; though I am only at the foot of it,” she repeated. 

" What does it remind you of?” I asked. 

“ Nothing. I never saw anything it could remind me of,” 
she answered. 

“ Nor read anything?” 

" Not that I remember.” 

“ It reminds me of Mount Sinai in the Pilgrim’s Progress. 
You remember Christian was afraid because the side of it 
which was next the wayside did hang so much over that he 
thought it would fall on his head.” 

“ I never read the Pilgrim’s Progress,” she returned in a 
careless if not contemptuous tone. 

“ Didn’t you ? Oh, you would like it so much !” 

“ I don’t think I should. I don’t like religious books.” 

“ But that is such a good story !” 

“ Oh ! it’s all a trap— sugar on the outside of a pill 1 The 
sting’s in the tail of it. They’re all like that. I know them.” 

This silenced me, and for a while we went on without 
speaking. 

The rain ceased ; the mist cleared a little ; and I began to 
think I saw some landmarks I knew. A moment more, and 
I perfectly understood where we were. 

« I’m all right now, sir,” I said to Mr. Coningham. I can 
find my way from here.” 


156 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


As I spoke I pulled up and proceeded to dismount. 

"Sit still/’ he said. “We cannot do better than ride on to 
Mr. Forest’s. I don’t know him much, but I have met him, 
and in a strange country all are friends. I dare say he will 
take us in for the night. Do you think he could house us ?” 

“ I have no doubt of it. For that matter, the boys could 
crowd a little.” 

“ Is it far from here ?” 

“ Not above two miles, I think.” 

“ Are you sure you know the way ?” 

“ Quite sure.” 

“ Then you take the lead.” 

I did so. He spoke to the guide, and Clara and I rode on 
in front. 

“You and I seem destined to have adventures together, 
Clara,” I said. 

“ It seems so. But this is not so much of an adventure as 
that night on the leads,” she answered. 

“ You would not have thought so if you had been with me 
in the morning.” 

“ Were you very much frightened?” 

“ I was. And then to think of finding you !” 

“ It was funny, certainly.” 

When we reached the house there was great jubilation over 
me, but Mr. Forest himself was very serious. He had not 
been back more than half an hour, and was just getting ready 
to set out again, accompanied by men from the village below. 
Most of the boys were quite knocked up, for they had been 
looking for me ever since they missed me. Charley was in a 
dreadful way. When he saw me he burst into tears, and 
declared he would never let me out of his sight again. But 
if he had been with me it would have been death to both of 
us : I could never have got him over the ground. 

Mr. and Mrs. Forest received their visitors with the great- 
est cordiality, and invited them to spend a day or two with 
them, to which, after some deliberation, Mr. Coningham 
agreed. 


AGAIN THE ICE-CAVE. 


157 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

AGAIN THE ICE-CAVE. 

The next morning he begged a holiday for me and Charley, 
of whose family he knew something, although he was not 
acquainted with them. I was a little disappointed at 
Charley’s being included in the request, not in the least from 
jealousy, but because I had set my heart on taking Clara to 
the cave in the ice, which I knew Charley would not like. 
But I thought we could easily arrange to leave him some- 
where near until we returned. I spoke to Mr. Coningham 
about it, who entered into my small scheme with the greatest 
kindness. Charley confided to me afterward that he did not 
take to him — ^he was too like an ape, he said. But the im- 
pression of his ugliness had with me quite worn off* ; and for 
his part, if I had been a favorite nephew he could not have 
been more complaisant and hearty. 

I felt very stiff when we set out, and altogether not quite 
myself ; but the discomfort wore oflT as we went. Charley 
had Mr. Coningham’s horse, and I walked by the side of 
Clara’s, eager after any occasion, if but a pretence, of being 
useful to her. She was quite familiar with me, but seemed 
shy of Charley. He looked much more of a man than I ; for 
not only, as I have said, had he grown much during his ill- 
ness, but there was an air of troubled thoughtfulness about 
him which made him look considerably older than he really 
was ; while his delicate complexion and large blue eyes had a 
kind of mystery about them that must have been very attrac- 
tive. 

When we reached the village, I told Charley that we 
wanted to go on foot to the cave, and hoped he would not 
mind waiting our return. But he refused to be left, declaring 
he should not mind going in the least ; that he was quite well 


158 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


now, and ashamed of his behaviour on the former occasion ; 
that, in fact, it must have been his approaching illness that 
caused it. I could not insist, and we set out. The footpath 
led us through fields of corn, with a bright sun overhead, and 
a sweet wind blowing. It was a glorious day of golden corn, 
gentle wind, and blue sky, with great masses of white snow, 
whiter than any cloud, held up in it. 

We descended the steep bank; we crossed the wooden 
bridge over the little river ; we crunched under our feet the 
hail-like crystals lying rough on the surface of the glacier ; we 
reached the cave and entered the blue abyss. I went first into 
the delicious, yet dangerous-looking blue. The cave had 
several sharp angles in it. When I reached the farthest 
corner I turned to look behind me. I was alone. I walked 
back and peeped round the last comer. Between that and 
the one beyond it stood Clara and Charley, staring at each 
other with faces of ghastly horror. 

Clara’s look certainly could not have been the result of any 
excess of imagination. But many women respond easily to 
influences they could not have originated. My conjecture is, 
that the same horror had again seized upon Charley when he 
saw Clara ; that it made his face, already death-like, tenfold 
more fearful ; that Clara took fright at his fear, her imagina- 
tion opening like a crystal to the polarized light of reflected 
feeling ; and thus they stood in the paralysis of a dismay 
which ever multiplied itself in the opposed mirrors of their 
countenances. 

I too was in terror — for Charley certainly wasted no time 
in speculation. I went forward instantly, and put an arm 
round each. They woke up, as it were, and tried to laugh. 
But the laugh was worse than the stare. I hurried them out 
of the place. 

We came upon Mr. Coningham round the next corner, 
amusing himself with the talk of the half-silly guide. 

“ Where are you going ?” he asked. 

“ Out again,” I answered. “ The air is oppressive.” 

‘‘ Nonsense,” he said merrily. “ The air is as pure as it is 


AGAIN THE ICE-CAVE. 159 

cold. Come, Clara ; I want to explore the penetralia of this 
temple of Isis.” 

I believe he intended a pun. 

Clara turned with him ; Charley and I went out into the 
sunshine. 

“ You should not have gone, Charley. You have caught a 
chill again,” I said. 

“No, nothing of the sort,” he answered. “Only it was too 
dreadful. That lovely face! To see it like that — and know 
that is what it is coming to I” 

“You looked as horrid yourself,” I returned. 

“ I don’t doubt it. We all did. But why?” 

“ Why, just because of the blueness,” I answered. 

“ Yes — the blueness, no doubt. That was all. But there it 
was, you know.” 

Clara came out smiling. All her horror had vanished. I 
was looking into the hole as she turned the last corner. 
When she first appeared, her face was “ like one that hath 
been seven days drowned ; ” but as she advanced, the decay 
thinned, and the life grew, until at last she stepped from the 
mouth of the sepulchre in all the glow of her merry youth. 
It was a dumb show of the resurrection. 

As we went back to the inn, Clara, who was walking in front 
with her father, turned her head and addressed me suddenly. 

“ You see it was all a sham, Wilfrid ! ” she said. 

“ What was a sham ? I don’t know what you mean,” I 
rejoined. 

“ Why that,” she returned, pointing with her hand. Then 
addressing her father, “ Isn’t that the Eiger,” she asked — “ the 
same we rode under yesterday ?” 

“ To be sure it is,” he answered. 

She turned again to me. 

“ You see it is all a sham ! Last night it pretended to be 
on the very edge of the road and hanging over our heads at 
an awful height. Now it has gone a long way back, is not so 
very high, and certainly does not hang over. I ought not to 
have been satisfied with that precipice. It took me in.” 


160 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I did not reply at once. Clara’s words appeared to me 
quite irreverent, and I recoiled from the very thought that 
there could be any sham in nature ; but what to answer her I 
did not know. I almost began to dislike her ; for it is often 
incapacity for defending the faith they love which turns men 
into persecutors. 

Seeing me foiled, Charley advanced with the doubtful air 
of a sophism to help me. 

“ Which is the sham. Miss Clara ?” he asked. 

“ That Eiger mountain there.” 

“ Ah ! so I thought.” 

“ Then you are of my opinion, Mr. Osborne ?” 

“ You mean the mountain is shamming, don’t you — looking 
far off when really it is near ?” 

“ Not at all. When it looked last night as if it hung right 
over our heads, it was shamming. See it now — ^far away there !” 

“ But which then is the sham, and which is the true ? It 
looked near yesterday and now it looks far away. Which is 
which ?” 

“It must have been a sham yesterday; for although it 
looked near, it was very dull and dim, and you could only see 
the sharp outline of it.” 

“ Just so I argue on the other side : The mountain must be 
shamming now, for although it looks so far off, it yet shows a 
most contradictory clearness — not only of outline but of 
surface.” 

“Aha!” thought I, “Miss Clara has found her match. 
They both know he is talking nonsense, yet she can’t answer 
him. What she was saying was nonsense too, but I can’t 
answer it either — not yet.” 

I felt proud of both of them, but of Charley in especial, 
for I had no idea he could be so quirk. 

“ What ever put such an answer in your head, Charley ?” I 
exclaimed. 

“ Oh I it’s not quite original,” he returned. “ I believe it 
was suggested by two or three lines I read in a review just 
before we left home. They took a hold of me rather.” 


AGAIN THE ICE-CAVE. 


161 


He repeated half of the now well-known little poem of 
Shelley, headed Passage of the Apennines. He had forgotten 
the name of the writer, and it was many years before I fell in 
with them myself : — 

" The Apennine in the light of day 
Is a mighty mountain dim and gray, 

Which between the earth and sky doth lay ; 

But when night comes, a chaos dread 
On the dim starlight then is spread, 

And the Apennine walks abroad with the storm.** 

In the middle of it I saw Clara begin to titter, but she did 
not interrupt him. When he had finished, she said with a 
grave face, too grave for seriousness : — 

“Will you repeat the third line — I think it was, Mr. 
Osborne ?” 

He did so. 

“ What kind of eggs did the Apennine lay, Mr. Osborne ?’* 
she asked, still perfectly serious. 

Charley was abashed to find that she could take advantage 
of probably a provincialism to turn into ridicule such fine 
verses. Before he could recover himself, she had planted 
another blow or two. 

“ And where is its nest ? Between the earth and the sky is 
vague. But then to be sure it must want a good deal of 
room. And after all, a mountain is a strange fowl, and who 
knows where it might lay ? Between earth and sky is quite 
definite enough. Besides, the bird-nesting boys might be 
dangerous if they knew where it was. It would be such a 
find for them 

My champion was defeated. Without attempting a word in 
reply, he hung back and dropped behind. Mr. Coningham 
must have heard the whole, but he offered no remark. I saw 
that Charley’s sensitive nature was hurt, and my heart was sore 
for him. 

“ That’s too bad of you, Clara,” I said. 

“ What’s too bad of me, Wilfrid ?” she returned. 

I hesitated a moment, then answered : 

11 


162 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ To make game of such verses. Any one with half a soul 
must see they were fine.” 

“ Very wrong of you, indeed, my dear,” said Mr. Coningham 
from behind, in a voice that sounded as if he were smothering 
a laugh ; but when I looked round, his face was grave. 

“ Then I suppose that half soul I haven’t got,” returned 
Clara. 

“ Oh ! I didn’t mean that,” I said, lamely enough. “ But 
there’s no logic in that kind of thing, you know.” 

“You see, papa,” said Clara, “what you are accountable 
for. Why didn’t you make them teach me logic ?” 

Her father smiled a pleased smile. His daughter’s naivete 
would in his eyes make up for any lack of logic. 

“ Mr. Osborne,” continued Clara, turning back, “ I beg your 
pardon. I am a woman, and you men don’t allow us to learn 
logic. But at the same time you must confess you were making 
a bad use of yours. You know it was all nonsense you were 
trying to pass off* on me for wisdom.” 

He was by her side the instant she spoke to him. A smile 
grew upon his face : I could see it growing, just as you see the 
sun growing behind a cloud. In a moment it broke out in 
radiance. 

“ I confess,” he said, “ I thought you were too hard on Wil- 
frid ; and he hadn’t anything at hand to say for himself.” 

“ And you were too hard upon me, weren’t you ? Two to one 
is not fair play — is it now ?” 

“ No ; certainly not.” 

“ And that justified a little false play on my part ?” 

“ No, it did noi,” said Charley, almost fiercely. “ Nothing 
justifies false play.” 

“Not even yours, Mr. Osborne?” replied Clara, with a 
stately coldness quite marvellous in one so young ; and leaving 
him, she came again to my side. I peeped at Mr. Coningham, 
curious to see how he regarded all this wrangling with his 
daughter. He appeared at once amused and satisfied. Clara’s 
face was in a glow, clearly of anger, at the discourteous man- 
ner in which Charley had spoken. 


AGAIN THE ICE-CAVE. 


163 


“ You mustn’t be angry with Charley, Clara,” I said. 

“ He is very rude,” she replied indignantly. 

“ What he said was rude, I allow, but Charley himself is 
anything but rude. I haven’t looked at him, but I am certain 
he is miserable about it already.” 

“ So he ought to be. To speak like that to a lady, when her 
very friendliness put her off her guard I I never was treated 
so in all my life.” 

She spoke so loud that she must have meant Charley to hear 
her. But when I looked back, I saw that he had fallen a long 
way behind, and was coming on very slowly, with dejected 
look and his eyes on the ground. Mr. Coningham did not in- 
terfere by word or sign. 

When we reached the inn he ordered some refreshment, and 
behaved to us both as if we were grown men. Just a touch 
of familiarity was the sole indication that we were not grown 
men. Boys are especially grateful for respect from their supe- 
riors, for it helps them to respect themselves ; but Charley sat 
silent and gloomy. As he would not ride back, and Mr. Co- 
ningham preferred walkmg too, I got into the saddle and rode 
by Clara’s side. 

As we approached the house, Charley crept up to the other 
side of Clara’s horse, and laid his hand on his mane. When 
he spoke Clara started^ for she was looking the other way and 
had not observed his approach. 

“ Miss Clara,” he said, “ I am very sorry I was so rude. 
Will you forgive me ?’* 

Instead of being hard to reconcile, as I had feared from her 
outburst of indignation, she leaned forward and laid her hand 
on his. He looked up in her face, his own suffused with a 
color I had never seen in it before. His great blue eyes light- 
ened with thankfulness, and began to fill with tears. How she 
looked, I could not see. She withdrew her hand, and Charley 
dropped behind again. In a little while he came up to my 
side, and began talking. He soon got quite merry, but Clara 
in her turn was silent. 

I doubt if anything would be worth telling but for what 


164 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


comes after. History itself would be worthless but for what 
it cannot tell, namely, its own future. Upon this ground my 
reader must excuse the apparent triviality of the things I am 
now relating. 

When we were alone in our room that night — for ever since 
Charley’s illness we two had had a room to ourselves — Charley 
said: 

“ I behaved like a brute this morning, Wilfrid.” 

“ No, Charley ; you were only a little rude from being over 
eager. If she had been seriously advocating dishonesty, you 
would have been quite right to take it up so ; and you thought 
she was.” 

“ Yes ; but it was very silly of me. I dare say it was because 
I had been so dishonest myself just before. How dreadful it 
is that I am always taking my own side, even when I do what 
I am ashamed of in another. I suppose I think I have got 
my horse by the head, and the other has not.” 

“ I don’t know. That may be it,” I answered. “ I’m afraid 
I can’t think about it to-night, for I don’t feel well. What if 
it should be your turn to nurse me now, Charley ?” 

He turned quite pale, his eyes opened wide, and he looked 
at me anxiously. 

Before morning I was aching all over ; I had rheumatic 
fever. 


CHARLEY NURSES ME. 


165 


CHAPTER XIX. 

CHARLEY NURSES ME. 

I SAW no more of Clara. Mr. Coningham came to bid me 
good-bye, and spoke very kindly. Mr. Forest would have got 
a nurse for me, but Charley begged so earnestly to be allowed 
to return the service I had done for him, that he yielded. 

I was in great pain for more than a week. Charley’s atten- 
tions were unremitting. In fact he nursed me more like a wo- 
man than a boy ; and made me think with some contrition 
how poor my ministrations had been. Even after the worst 
was over, if I but moved, he was at my bedside in a moment. 
Certainly no nurse could have surpassed him. I could bear no 
one to touch me but him : from any one else I dreaded torture ; 
and my medicine was administered to the very moment by my 
own old watch, which had been brought to do its duty at least 
respectably. 

One afternoon, finding me tolerably comfortable, he said: 

“ Shall I read something to you, Wilfrid ?” 

He never Called me Willie^ as most of my friends did, 

“ I should like it,” 1 answered. 

“ What shall I read ?” he asked. 

Hadn’t you something in your head,” I rejoined, “ when 
you proposed it ?” 

“ Well, I had ; but I don’t know if you would like it.” 

‘‘ What did you think of then ?” 

“ I thought of a chapter in the New Testament.” 

“ How could you think I should not like that ?” 

“ Because I never saw you say your prayers.” 

“ That is quite true. But you don’t think I never say my 
prayers although you never see me do it ?” 

The fact was, my uncle, amongst his other peculiarities, did 
not approve of teaching children to say their prayers. But he 


166 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


did not therefore leave me without instruction in the matter of 
praying —either the idlest or the most availing of human ac- 
tions. would say, “ When you want anything, ask for it 
Willie ; and if it is worth your having, you will have it. But 
don’t fancy you are doing God any service by praying to him. 
He likes you to pray to him because he loves you, and wants 
you to love him. And whatever you do, don’t go saying a lot 
of words you don’t mean. If you think you ought to pray, 
say your Lord’s Prayer, and have done with it.” I had no 
theory myself on the matter ; but when I was in misery on the 
wild mountains, I had indeed prayed to God ; and had even 
gone so far as to hope, when I got what I prayed for, that he 
had heard my prayer. 

Charley made no reply. 

“ It seems to me better that sort of thing should not be seen, 
Charley,” I persisted. 

“ Perhaps, Wilfrid ; but I was taught to say my prayers 
regularly.” 

“ I don’t think much of that either,” I answered. ‘‘ But I’ve 
said a good many prayers since I’ve been here, Charley. I 
can’t say I’m sure it’s of any use, but I can’t help trying after 
something — I don’t know what — something I want, and don’t 
know how to get.” 

“ But it’s only the prayer of faith that’s heard. Do you be- 
lieve, Wilfrid ?” 

“ I don’t know. I daren’t say I don’t. I wish I could say 
I do. But I dare say things will be considered.” 

“ Wouldn’t it be grand if it was true, Wilfrid?” 

« What, Charley?” 

** That God actually let his creatures see him — and — all that 
came of it, you know.” 

“ It would be grand indeed ! But supposing it true, how 
could we be expected to believe it like them that saw him with 
their own eyes ? I couldn’t be required to believe just as if 
I could have no doubt about it. It wouldn’t be fair. Only — 
perhaps we haven’t got the clew by the right end.” 

“ Perhaps not. But sometimes I hate the whole thing. And 


CHARLEY NURSES ME. 


167 


then again I feel as if I must read all about it ; not that I care 
for it exactly, but because a body must do something — because 
— I don’t know how to say it — because of the misery, you 
know.” 

“ I don’t know that I do know —quite. But now you have 
started the subject, I thought that was great nonsense Mr, 
Forest was talking about the authority of the church the other 
day.” 

“ Well, I thought so, too. I don’t see what right they have 
to say so and so, if they didn’t hear him speak. As to what 
he meant, they may be right or they may be wrong. K they 
have the gift of the Spirit, as they say — how am I to tell they 
have ? All impostors claim it as well as the true men. If I 
had ever so little of the same gift myself, I suppose I could 
tell ; but they say no one has till he believes — so they may be 
all humbugs for anything I can possibly tell ; or they may be 
all true men and yet I may fancy them all humbugs, and can’t 
help it.” 

I was quite as much astonished to hear Charley talk in this 
style, as some readers will be doubtful whether a boy could 
have talked such good sense. I said nothing, and a silence 
followed. 

“ Would you like me to read to you then?” he asked. 

“ Yes, I should ; for, do you know, after all, I don’t think 
there’s anything like the New Testament.” 

Anything like it!” he repeated. “I should think not! 
Only I wish I did know what it all meant. I wish I could talk 
to my father as I would to Jesus Christ if I saw Mm. But if 
I could talk to my father, he wouldn’t understand me. He 
would speak to me as if I were the very scum of the universe 
for daring to have a doubt of what he told me.” 

“ But he doesn’t mean himself” I said. 

“ Well, who told him ?” 

“The Bible.” 

“ And who told the Bible ?” 

“ God, of course.” 

“But how am I to know that ? I only know that they say 


168 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


SO. Do you know, Wilfrid — I donH believe my father is quite 
sure himself, and that is what makes him in such a rage with 
anybody who doesn’t think as he does. He’s afraid it mayn’t 
be true after all.” 

I had never had a father to talk to, but I thought some- 
thing must be wrong when a boy couldn’t talk to his father. 
My uncle was a better father than that came to. 

Another pause followed, during which Charley searched for 
a chapter to fit the mood. I will not say what chapter he 
found, for, after all, I doubt if we had any real notion of what 
it meant. I know, however, that there were words in it which 
found their way to my conscience ; and, let men of science or 
philosophy say what they will, the rousing of a man’s con- 
science is the greatest event in his existence. In such a 
matter, the consciousness of the man himself is the sole wit- 
ness. A Chinese can expose many of the absurdities and 
inconsistencies of the English : it is their own Shakspeare who 
must bear witness to their sins and faults, as well as their 
truths and characteristics. 

After this we had many conversations about such things, 
one of which I shall attempt to report bye and bye. Of 
course in any such attempt, all that can be done is to put the 
effect into fresh conversational form. What I have just 
written must at least be more orderly than what passed 
between us ; but the spirit is much the same ; and mere fact 
is of consequence only as it affects truth. 


A DREAM. 


169 


CHAPTER XX. 

A DREAM. 

The best immediate result of my illness was, that I learned 
to love Charley Osborne more dearly. We renewed an affec- 
tion resembling from afar that of Shakspeare for his nameless 
friend ; we anticipated that informing In Memoriam. Lest I 
be accused of infinite arrogance, let me remind my reader that 
the sun is reflected in a dewdrop as in the ocean. 

One night I had a strange dream, which is perhaps worth 
telling for the involution of its consciousness. 

I thought I was awake in my bed, and Charley asleep in 
his. I lay looking into the room. It began to waver and 
change. The night-light enlarged and receded ; and the walls 
trembled and waved about. The light had got behind them, 
and shone through them. 

“ Charley ! Charley !” I cried ; for I was frightened. 

I heard him move ; but before he reached me I was lying 
on a lawn, surrounded by trees, with the moon shining 
through them from behind. The next moment Charley was 
by my side. 

“ Isn’t it prime ?” he said. “ It’s all over !” 

“ What do you mean, Charley ?” I asked. 

“ I mean that we’re both dead now. It’s not so very bad — 
is it?” 

“ Nonsense, Charley !” I returned ; “ Tm not dead. I’m 
as wide alive as ever I was. Look here.” 

So saying, I sprang to my feet, and drew myself up before 
him. 

“ Where’s your worst pain ?” said Charley, with a curious 
expression in his tone. 

“ Here,” I answered. “No ; it’s not ; it’s in my back. No, 
it isn’t. It’s nowhere. I haven’t got any pain.” 


170 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Charley laughed a low laugh, which sounded as sweet as 
strange. It was to the laughter of the world “ as moonlight 
is to sunlight,” but not “ as water is to wine,” for what it had 
lost in sound it had gained in smile 

“Tell me now you’re not dead!” he exclaimed triumphantly. 

“ But,” I insisted, “ don’t you see I’m alive? You may be 
dead, for anything I know, but I am not — I know that.” 

“ You’re just as dead as I am,” he said. “ Look here.” 

A little way off, in an open plot by itself, stood a little white 
rose-tree, half mingled with the moonlight. Charley went up 
to it, stepped on the topmost twig, and stood : the bush did 
not even bend under him. 

“ Very well,” I answered. “ You are dead, I confess. But 
now, look you here.” 

I went to a red rose-bush which stood at some distance, 
blanched in the moon, set my foot on the top of it, and made 
as if I would ascend, expecting to crush it, roses and all, to 
the ground. But behold ! I was standing on my red rose op- 
posite Charley on his white. 

“ I told you so,” he cried, across the moonlight, and his 
voice sounded as if it came from the moon far away. 

“ Oh, Charley !” I cried, “ I’m so frightened !” 

“ What are you frightened at ?” 

“ At you. You’re dead, you know.” 

“It is a good thing, Wilfrid,” he rejoined, in a tone of some 
reproach, “that I am not frightened at you for the same 
reason ; for what would happen then ?” 

“ I don’t know. I suppose you would go away and leave 
me alone in this ghostly light.” 

“ If I were frightened at you as you are at me, we should 
not be able to see each other at all. If you take courage, the 
light will grow.” 

“ Don’t leave me, Charley,” I cried, and flung myself from 
my tree towards his. I found myself floating, half reclined 
on the air. We met midway each in the other’s arms. 

“ I don’t know where I am, Charley.” 

“ That is my father’s rectory.” 


A DREAM. 


171 


He pointed to the house, which I had not yet observed. It lay 
quite dark in the moonlight, for not a window shone from within. 

“ Don’t leave me, Charley.” 

“ Leave you ! 1 should think not, Wilfrid. I have been 
long enough without you already.” 

“ Have you been long dead, then, Charley ?” 

“ Not very long. Yes, a long time. But indeed I don’t 
know. We don’t count time as we used to count it. I want 
to go and see my father. It is long since I saw him, anyhow. 
Will you come ?” 

“ If you think I might— if you wish it,” I said, for I had 
no great desire to see Mr. Osborne. “Perhaps he won’t care 
to see me.” 

“Perhaps not,” said Charley, with another low silvery 
laugh. “ Come along.” 

We glided over the grass. A window stood a little open 
on the second floor. We floated up, entered, and stood by the 
bedside of Charley’s father. He lay in a sound sleep. 

“ Father ! father !” said Charley, whispering in his ear as 
he lay — “it’s all right. You need not be troubled about me 
any more.” 

Mr. Osborne turned on his pillow. 

“ He’s dreaming about us now,” said Charley. “ He sees 
us both standing by his bed.” 

But the next moment, Mr. Osborne sat up, stretched out 
his arms towards us with the open palms outward, as if 
pushing us away from him, and cried : 

“ Depart from me, all evil-doers. O Lord ! do I not hate 
them that hate thee ?” 

He followed with other yet more awful words which I never 
could recall. I only remember the feeling of horror and 
amazement they left behind. I turned to Charley. He had 
disappeared, and I found myself lying in the bed beside Mr. 
Osborne. I gave a great cry of dismay — when there was 
Charley again beside me, saying : 

“ What’s the matter, Wilfrid ? Wake up. My father’s not 
here.’^ 


172 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I did wake, but until I bad felt in the bed could not satisfy 
myself that Mr. Osborne was indeed not there. 

‘‘ You’ve been talking in your sleep. I could hardly get 
you waked,” said Charley, who stood there in his shirt. 

“ O Charley !” I cried, “ I’ve had such a dream !” 

“ What was it, Wilfrid ?” 

“Oh ! I can’t talk about it yet,” I answered. 

I never did tell him that dream ; for even then I was often 
uneasy about him — ^he was so sensitive. The affections of my 
friend were as hoops of steel ; his feelings a breath would 
ripple. O my Charley! if ever we meet in that land so 
vaguely shadowed in my dream, will you not know that I 
loved you heartily well? Shall I not hasten to lay bare my 
heart before you — the priest of its confessional? O Charley! 
when the truth is known, the false will fly asunder as the 
autumn leaves in the wind; but the true, whatever their 
faults, will only draw together the more tenderly that they 
have sinned against each other. 


THE FROZEN STREAM. 


173 


CHAPTER XXL 

THE FROZEN STREAM. 

Before the winter arrived I was well, and Charley had 
recovered the fatigue of watching me. One holiday he and I 
set out alone to accomplish a scheme we had cherished from 
the first appearance of the frost. How it arose I hardly 
remember ; I think it came of some remark Mr. Forest had 
made concerning the difference between the streams of 
Switzerland and England — those in the former country being 
emptiest, those in the latter fullest in the winter. It was — 
when the frost should have bound up the sources of the beck 
which ran almost by our door, and it was no longer a stream 
but a rope of ice— to take that rope for our guide, and follow 
it as far as we could towards the secret recesses of its summer 
birth. 

Along the banks of the stream, we followed it up and up, 
meeting a varied loveliness which it would take the soul of a 
Wordsworth or a Ruskin to comprehend and express. To my 
poor faculty the splendor of the ice-crystals remains the one 
memorable thing. In those lonely water-courses the sun was 
gloriously busy, with none to praise him except Charley and 
me. 

Where the banks were difficult we went down into the 
frozen bed, and there had story above story of piled-up love- 
liness, with opal and diamond cellars below. Spikes and stars 
crystalline radiated and refracted and reflected marvellously. 
But we did not reach the primary source of the stream by 
miles ; we were stopped by a precipitous rock, down the face 
of which one half of the stream fell, while the other crept out 
of its foot, from a little cavernous opening about four feet 
high. Charley was a few yards ahead of me, and ran stooping 
into the cavern. I followed. But when I had gone as far as 


174 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I dared for the darkness and the down-sloping roof, and saw 
nothing of him, I grew dismayed, and called him. There was 
no answer. With a thrill of horror, my dream returned upon 
me. I got on my hands and knees and crept forward. A 
short way farther the floor sank — only a little, I believe, but 
from the darkness I took the descent for an abyss into which 
Charley had fallen. I gave a shriek of despair, and scram- 
bled out of the cave howling. In a moment he was by my 
side. He had only crept behind a projection for a trick. His 
remorse was extreme. He begged my pardon in the most 
agonized manner. 

“ Never mind, Charley,” I said, “ you didn’t mean it.” 

“ Yes, I did mean it,” he returned. “ The temptation came, 
and I yielded ; only I did not know how dreadful it would 
be to you.” 

“ Of course not. You wouldn’t have done it if you had.” 

How am I to know that, Wilfrid ? I might have done it. 
Isn’t it frightfril that a body may go on and on till a thing is 
done, and then wish he hadn’t done it. I am a despicable 
creature. Do you know, Wilfrid, I once shot a little bird — ■ 
for no good, but just to shoot at something. It wasn’t that I 
didn’t think of it — don’t say that. I did think of it. I knew 
it was wrong. When I had leveled my gun I thought of it 
quite plainly, and yet drew the trigger. It dropped, a heap 
of ruffled feathers. I shall never get that little bird out of 
my head. And the worst of it is, that to all eternity I can 
never make any atonement.” 

“ But God will forgive you, Charley.” 

“ What do I care for that,” he rejoined, almost fiercely, 
“ when the little bird cannot forgive me ? I would go on my 
knees to the little bird if I could, to beg its pardon, and tell 
it what a brute I was, and it might shoot me if it would, and 
I should say ‘ Thank you.’ ” 

He laughed almost hysterically, and the tears ran down 
his face. 

I have said little about my uncle’s teaching lest I should 
bore my readers. But there it came in, and therefore here it 


UHE FKOZEN STREAM. 


175 


must come in. My uncle had, by no positive instruction, but 
by occasional observations, not one of which I can recall, 
generated in me a strong hope that the life of the lower 
anifnals was terminated at their death no more than our own. 
The man who believes that thought is the result of brain, and 
not the growth of an unknown seed whose soil is the brain, 
may well sneer at this, for he is to himself but a peck of dust 
that has to be eaten by the devouring jaw^ of Time ; but I 
cannot see how the man who believes in soul at all can say 
that the spirit of a man lives, and the spirit of his horse dies. 
I do not profess to believe anything for certain sure myself, 
but I do think that he who, if from merely philosophical con- 
siderations, believes the one, ought to believe the other as well. 
Much more must the theosophist believe it. But I had never 
felt the need of the doctrine until I beheld the misery of 
Charley over the memory of the dead sparrow. Surely that 
sparrow fell not to the ground without the Father’s know- 
ledge. 

“ Charley ! how do you know,” I said, “ that you can never 
beg the bird’s pardon ? If God made the bird, do you fancy 
with your gun you could destroy the making of his hand ? 
If he said, ‘ Let there be,’ do you suppose you could say 
‘ There shall not be ?’ ” (Mr. Forest had read that chapter 
of first things at morning prayers.) ‘‘ I fancy myself that for 
God to put a bird all in the power of a silly, thoughtless 
boy ” 

“Not thoughtless ! not thoughtless! There is the misery !” 
said Charley. 

But I went on — 

“ — would be worse than for you to shoot it.” 

A great glow of something I dare not attempt to define 
grew upon Charley’s face. It was like what I saw on it when 
Clara laid her hand on his. But presently it died out again, 
and he sighed — 

“ If there were a God — that is, if I were sure there was 
a God, Wilfrid 1” 

I could not answer. How could 1 1 I had never seen God, 


176 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


as the old story says Moses did on the clouded mountain. 
All I could return was, — 

“ Suppose there should be a God, Charley ? Mightn’t 
there be a God ?” 

“I don’t know,” he returned. “How should I know 
whether there might be a God ? ” 

“ But may there not be a might he I rejoined. 

“ There may be. How should I say the other thing? ” said 
Charley. 

I do not mean this was exactly what he or I said. Unable 
to recall the words themselves, I put the sense of the thing in 
as clear a shape as I can. 

We were seated upon a stone in the bed of the stream, off 
which the sun had melted the ice. The bank rose above us, 
but not far. I thought I heard a footstep. I jumped up, 
but saw no one. I ran a good way up the stream to a place 
where I could climb the bank ; but then saw no one. The 
footstep, real or imagined, broke our conversation at that 
point, and we did not resume it. All that followed was — 

“ If I were the sparrow, Charley, I would not only forgive 
you, but haunt you for ever out of gratitude that you were 
sorry you had killed me.” 

“ Then you do forgive me for frightening you?” he said eagerly. 

Very likely Charley and I resembled each other too much 
to be the best possible companions for each other. There was, 
however, this difference between us — ^that he had been bored 
with religion and I had not. In other words, food had been 
forced upon him, which had only been laid before me. 

We rose and went home. A few minutes after our entrance 
Mr. Forest came in — looking strange, I thought. The con- 
viction crossed my mind that it was his footstep we had heard 
over our heads as we sat in the channel of the frozen stream. 
I have reason to think that he followed us for a chance of 
listening. Something had set him on the watch — most likely 
the fact that we were so much together and did not care for 
the society of the rest of our schoolfellows. From that time, 
certainly, he regarded Charley and myself with a suspicious 


THE FROZEN STREAM. 


177 


gloom. We felt it, but beyond talking to each other about it, 
and conjecturing its cause, we could do nothing. It made 
Charley very unhappy at times, deepening the shadow which 
brooded over his mind ; for his moral skin was as sensitive to 
changes in the moral atmosphere as the most sensitive of 
plants to those in the physical. But unhealthy conditions in 
the smallest communities cannot last long without generating 
vapors which result in some kind of outburst. 

The other boys, naturally enough, were displeased with us 
for holding so much together. They attributed it to some 
fancy of superiority, whereas there was nothing in it beyond 
the simplest preference for each other’s society. We were 
alike enough to understand each other, and unlike enough to 
interest and aid each other. Besides, we did not care much 
for the sports in which boys usually explode their superfluous 
energy. I preferred a walk and a talk with Charley to 
anything else. 

I may here mention that these talks had nearly cured me 
of castle-building. To spin yarns for Charley’s delectation 
would have been absurd. He cared for nothing but the truth. 
And yet he could never assure himself that anything was true. 
The more likely a thing looked to be true, the more anxious 
was he that it should be unassailable ; and his fertile mind 
would in as many moments throw a score of objections at it, 
looking after each with eager eyes as if pleading for a refu- 
tation. It was the very love of what was good that generated 
in him doubt and anxiety. 

When our schoolfellows perceived that Mr. Forest also was 
dissatisfled with us, their displeasure grew to indignation ; and 
we did not endure its manifestations without a feeling of reflex 
defiance. 


178 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXIL 

AN EXPLOSION. 

One spring morning we had got up early and sauntered out 
together. I remember perfectly what our talk was about. 
Charley had started the question : “ How could it be just to 
harden Pharaoh’s heart and then punish him for what came 
of it?” I, who had been brought up without any superstitious 
reverence for the Bible, suggested that the narrator of the story 
might be accountable for the contradiction, and simply that it 
was not true that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Strange to 
say, Charley was rather shocked at this. He had as yet 
received the dogma of the infallibility of the Bible without 
thinking enough about it to question it. Nor did it now occur 
to him what a small affair it was to find a book fallible, com- 
pared with finding the God of whom the book spoke, fallible 
upon its testimony — for such was surely the dilemma. Men 
have been able to exist without a Bible: if there be a God it 
must be in and through Him that all men live ; only if he be 
not true, then in Him, and not in the first Adam, all men die. 

We were talking away about this, no doubt after a suflS- 
ciently crude manner, as we approached the house, unaware 
that we had lingered too long. The boys were coming out 
from breakfast for a game before school. 

Amongst them was one of the name of Home, who consid- 
ered himself superior from his connection with the Scotch 
Homes. He was a big, strong, pale-faced, handsome boy, with 
the least bit of a sneer always hovering upon his upper lip. 
Charley was half a head shorter than he, and I was half a 
head shorter than Charley. As we passed him, he said aloud, 
addressing the boy next him — 

“ There they go — a pair of sneaks !” 

Charley turned upon him at once, his face in a glow. 


EXPLOSION; 


179 


‘‘Home,” he said, “ no gentleman would say so.” 

“ And why not ?” said Home, turning and striding up to 
Charley in a magnificent manner. 

“ Because there is no ground for the assertion,” said Charley. 

“Then you mean to say I am a liar.” 

“I mean to sslj” returned Charley, with more promptitude 
than I could have expected of him, “ that if you are a gentle- 
man you will be sorry for it.” 

“ There is my apology then !” said Home, and struck Char- 
ley a blow on the head which laid him on the ground. I be- 
lieve he repented it the moment he had done it. 

I caught one glimpse of the blood pouring over the transpa- 
rent blue-veined skin, and rushed at Home in a transport of 
fury. 

I never was brave one step beyond being able to do what 
must be done and bear what must be borne; and now it was 
not courage that inspired me, but a righteous wrath. 

I did my best, got a good many hard blows, and planted not 
one in return, for I had never fought in my life. I do believe 
Home spared me, conscious of wrong. Meantime some of 
them had lifted Charley and carried him into the house. 

Before I was thoroughly mauled, which must have been the 
final result, for I would not give in, the master appeared, and 
in a voice such as I had never heard from him before, ordered 
us all into the schoolroom. 

“ Fighting like bullies !” he said. “ I thought my pupils 
were gentlemen at least !” 

Perhaps dimly aware that he had himself given some occa- 
sion to this outbreak, and imagining in his heart a show of 
justice, he seized Home by the collar, and gave him a terrible 
cut with the riding-whip which he had caught up in his anger. 
Home cried out, and the same moment Charley appeared, pale 
as death. 

“ Oh, sir !” he said, laying his hand on the master’s arm, ap- 
pealingly, “ I was to blame too.” 

“I don’t doubt it,” returned Mr. Forest. “ I shall settle with 
you presently. Get away.” 


180 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Now, sir !” he continued, turning to me — and held the whip 
suspended, as if waiting a word from me to goad him on. He 
looked something else than a gentleman himself just then. It 
was a sudden outbreak of the beast in him. 

“ Will you tell me why you punish me, sir, if you please ? 
What have I done ?” I said. 

His answer was such a stinging blow that for a moment I 
was bewildered, and everything reeled about me. But I did 
not cry out — I know that, for I asked two of the fellows after. 

*‘You prate about justice!’* he said. “I will let you know 
what justice means — ^to you at least.” 

And down came a second cut as bad as the first. My blood 
was up. 

“ If this is justice, then there is no God,” I said. 

He stood aghast. I went on. 

“ If there be a God ” 

there be a God !” he shrieked, and sprang towards me. 

I did not move a step. 

“ I hope there is,” I said, as he seized me again ; “ for you 
are unjust.” 

I remember only a fierce succession of blows. With Voltaire 
and the French revolution present to his mind in all their 
horror, he had been nourishing in his house a toad of the same 
spawn ! He had been remiss, but would now compel those 
whom his neglect had injured to pay off his arrears! A most 
orthodox conclusion ! but it did me little harm : it did not 
make me think that God was unjust, for my uncle, not Mr. 
Forest, was my type of Christian. The harm it did was of 
another sort — and to Charley, not to me. 

Of course, while under the hands of the executioner, I could 
not observe what was going on around me. When I began to 
awake from the absorption of my pain and indignation, I found 
myself in my room. I had been ordered thither, and had 
mechanically obeyed. I was on my bed, staring at the door, 
at which I had become aware of a gentleman tapping. 

“Come in,” I said; and Charley—who, although it was his 
room as much as mine, never entered when he thought I was 


AN EXPLOSION. 


181 


there without knocking at the door — appeared, with the face 
of a dead man. Sore as I was, I jumped up. 

“ The brute has not been thrashing yoUj Charley !” I cried 
in a wrath that gave me the strength of a giant. With that 
terrible bruise above his temple from Home’s fist, none but a 
devil could have dared to lay hands upon him ! 

“No, Wilfrid,” he answered; “no such honor for me! I 
am disgraced for ever I” 

He hid his wan face in his thin hands. 

“What do you mean, Charley ?” I said. “You cannot have 
told a lie 1” 

“No, Wilfrid. But it doesn’t matter now. I don’t care for 
myself any more.” 

“ Then, Charley, what have you done ?” 

“You are always so kind, Wilfrid!” he returned with a 
hopelessness which seemed almost coldness. 

“ Charley,” I said, “ if you don’t tell me what has hap- 
pened ” 

“ Happened !” he cried. “ Hasn’t that man been lashing at 
you like a dog, and I didn't rush at him, and if I couldn’t fight, 
being a milksop, then bite and kick and scratch, and take my 
share of it ? O God !” he cried in agony, “ if I had but a 
chance again ! But nobody ever has more than one chance in 
this world. He may damn me now when he likes : I don’t care.” 

“ Charley ! Charley !” I cried ; “ you’re as bad as Mr. Forest. 
Are you to say such things about God, when you know nothing 
of him ? He may be as good a God, after all, as even we 
should like him to be.” 

“ But Mr. Forest is a clergyman.” 

“ And God was the God of Abraham before ever there was 
a clergyman to take his name in vain,” I cried ; for I was 
half mad with the man who had thus wounded my Charley. 
“ I am content with you, Charley. You are my best and only 
friend. That is all nonsense about attacking Forest. What 
could you have done, you know ? — Don’t talk such rubbish.” 

“ I might have taken my share with you,” said Charley, 
and again buried his face in his hands. 


182 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Come, Charley,” I said, and at the same moment a fresh 
wave of manhood swept through my soul ; “ you and I will 
take our share together a hundred times yet. I have done 
my part now ; your’s will come now.” 

“ But to think of not sharing your disgrace, Wilfrid !” 

“ Disgrace !” I said, drawing myself up, “ where was that T 

“ You have been beaten,” he said. 

“ Every stripe was a badge of honor,” I said, for I neither 
deserved it nor cried out against it. I feel no disgrace.” 

“Well, IVe missed the honor,” said Charley; “but that’s 
nothing, so you have it. But not to share your disgrace 
would have been mean. And it’s all one ; for I thought it 
was disgrace and I did not share it. I am a coward forever, 
Wilfrid.” 

“Nonsense! He never gave you a chance. I never 
thought of striking back ; how should you f* 

“I will be your slave, Wilfrid! You are so good, and I 
am so unworthy.” 

He put his arms around me, laid his head on my shoulder, 
and sobbed. I did what more I could to comfort him, and 
gradually he grew calm. At length he whispered in my ear — ■ 

“ After all, Wilfrid, I do believe I was horror-struck, and it 
wasnH cowardice pure and simple.” 

“ I haven’t a doubt of it,” I said. “ I love you more than 
ever.” 

“ Oh Wilfrid ! I should have gone mad by this time but 
for you. Will you be my friend whatever happens ? — Even 
if I should be a coward after all?” 

“ Indeed I will, Charley. — ^What do you think Forest will 
do next ?” 

We resolved not to go down until we were sent for; and 
then to be perfectly quiet, not speaking to any one unless we 
were spoken to ; and at dinner we carried out our resolution. 

When bedtime came, we went as usual to make our bow to 
Mr. Forest. 

“ Cumbermede,” he said sternly, “ you sleep in No. 5 until 
further orders.” 


AN EXPLOSION. 183 

“ Very well, sir,” I said, and went, but lingered long 
enough to hear- the fate of Charley. 

“ Home,” said Mr. Forest, “ you go to No. 8.” 

That was our room. 

“Home,” I said, having lingered on the stairs until he 
appeared, “ you don’t bear me a grudge, do you ?” 

“ It was my fault,” said Home. “ I had no right to pitch 
into you. Only you’re such a cool beggar ! But by Jove I 
didn’t think Forest would have been so imfair. If you for- 
give me. I’ll forgive you.” 

“ If I hadn’t stood up to you I couldn’t,” I returned. “ I 
knew I hadn’t a chance. Besides, I hadn’t any breakfast.” 

“I was a brute,” said Home. 

“Oh I don’t mind for myself; but there’s Osborne I I 
^»^onder you could hit ^im.” 

“ He shouldn’t have jawed me,” said Home. 

“ But you did first.” 

We had reached the door of the room which had been 
Home’s and was now to be mine, and went in together. 

“ Didn’t you, now?” I insisted. 

“Well I did ; I confess I did : and it was very plucky of him.” 

“ Tell him that. Home,” I said. “ For God’s sake tell him 
that. It will comfort him. You must be kind to him. 
Home. We’re not so bad as Forest takes us for.” 

“ I will,” said Home. 

And he kept his word. 

We were never allowed to share the same room again, 
and school was not what it had been to either of us. 

Within a few weeks, Charley’s father, to our common dis- 
may, suddenly appeared, and the next morning took him 
away. What he said to Charley I do not know. He did not 
take the least notice of me, and I believe would have pre- 
vented Charley from saying a good-bye to me. But just as 
they were going, Charley left his father’s side, and came up to 
me with a flush on his face, and a flash in his eye that made 
him look more manly and handsome than I had ever seen 
him, and shook hands with me, saying — 


184 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


all right — ^isn’t it, Wilfrid?” 

“ It is all right, Charley, come what will,” I answered. 

“ Good-bye, then, Wilfrid.” 

** Good-bye, Charley.” 

And so we parted, 

I do not care to say one word more about the school. I 
continued there for another year and a half. Partly in 
misery, partly in growing eagerness after knowledge, I gave 
myself to my studies with more diligence. Mr. Forest began 
to be pleased with me, and I have no doubt plumed 
himself on the vigorous measures by which he had nipped the 
bud of my infidelity. For my part I drew no nearer to him, 
for I could not respect or trust him after his injustice. I did 
my work for its own sake, uninfluenced by any desire to please 
him. There was in fact no true relation between us any more. 

I communicated nothing of what had happened to my 
uncle, because Mr. Forest’s custom was to read every letter 
before it left the house. But I longed for the day when I 
could tell the whole story to the great, simple-hearted man. 


ONLY A LINK. 


185 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

ONLY A LINK. 

Before my return to England, I found that familiarity 
with the sights and sounds of a more magnificent nature had 
removed my past life to a great distance. What had inter- 
ested my childhood had strangely dwindled, yet gathered a 
new interest from its far-off and forsaken look. So much did 
my past wear to me now the look of something read in a 
story, that I am haunted with a doubt whether I may not 
have communicated too much of this appearance to my 
description of it, although I have kept as true as my recollec- 
tions would enable me. The outlines must be correct ; if the 
coloring be unreal, it is because of the haze which hangs 
about the memories of the time. 

The revisiting of old scenes is like walking into a mauso- 
leum. Everything is a monument of something dead and 
gone. For we die daily. Happy those who daily come to 
life as well ! 

I returned with a clear conscience, for not only had I as yet 
escaped corruption, but for the greater part of the time at 
least I had worked well. If Mr. Forest’s letter, which I car- 
ried to my uncle, contained any hint intended to my disad- 
vantage, it certainly fell dead on his mind ; for he treated me 
with a consideration and respect which at once charmed 
and humbled me. 

I fiilly expected that now at least he would tell me the 
history of the watch and the sword ; but even yet I was dis- 
appointed. But I doubt whether, indeed, he could have 
given me any particulars. One day, as we were walking 
together over the fields, I told him the whole story of the loss 
of the weapon at Moldwarp Hall. Up to the time of my 
leaving for Switzerland I had shrunk from any reference to 


186 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


the subject, so painful was it to me, and so convinced was I 
that his sympathy would be confined to a compassionate smile 
and a few words of condolence. But glancing at his face now 
and then as I told the tale, I discovered more of interest in 
the play of his features than I had expected ; and when he 
learned that it was absolutely gone from me, his face flushed 
with what seemed anger. For some moments after I had 
finished, he was silent. At length he said, 

“It is a strange story, Wilfrid, my boy. There must be 
some explanation of it, however.” 

He then questioned me about Mr. Close, for suspicion 
pointed in his direction. I was in great hopes he would follow 
my narrative with what he knew of the sword, but he was 
still silent, and I could not question him, for I had long sus- 
pected that its history had to do with the secret which he 
wanted me to keep from myself. 

The very day of my arrival, I went up to my grandmother’s 
room, which I found just as she had left it. There stood her 
easy-chair, there her bed, there the old bureau. The room 
looked far less mysterious now that she was not there ; but it 
looked painfully deserted. One thing alone was still as it 
were enveloped in its ancient atmosphere — the bureau. I 
tried to open it — with some trembling, I confess ; but only the 
drawers below were unlocked, and in them I found nothing 
but garments of old-fashioned stuffs, which I dared not touch. 

But the day of childish romance was over, and life itself 
was too strong and fresh to allow me to brood on the past for 
more than an occasional half-hour. My thoughts were full 
of Oxford, whither my uncle had resolved I should go ; and I 
worked hard in preparation. 

“ I have not much money to spare, my boy,” he said. “ But 
I have insured my life for a sum sufficient to provide for your 
aunt, if she should survive me ; and after her death it will 
come to you. Of course, the old house and the park, which 
have been in the family for more years than I can tell, will be 
yours at my death. A good part of the farm was once ours 
too, but not for these many years. I could not recommend 


ONLY A LINK. 


187 


you to keep on the farm ; but I confess I should be sorry if you 
were to part with our little place, although I do not doubt you 
might get a good sum for it from Sir Giles, to whose park it 
would be a desirable addition. I believe, at one time, the 
refusal to part with the poor little vineyard of Naboth was 
cause of great offence, even of open feud between the great 
family at the Hall and the yeomen who were your ancestors ; 
but poor men may be as unwilling as rich to break one strand 
of the cord that binds them to the past. But, of course, when 
you come into the property, you will do as you see fit with 
your own.” 

“ You don’t think, uncle, I would sell this house, or the field 
it stands in, for all the Mold warp estate ? I, too, have my 
share of pride in the family, although as yet I know nothing 
of its history.” 

“ Surely, Wilfrid, the feeling for one’s Dwn people who have 
gone before, is not necessarily pride ! ” 

It doesn’t much matter what you call it, uncle.” 

“ Yes, it does, my boy. Either you call it by the right name 
or by the wrong name. If your feeling is pride, then I am 
not objecting to the name, but the thing. If your feeling is 
not pride, why call a good thing by a bad name ? But to 
return to our subject : my hope is, that if I give you a good 
education, you will make your own way. You might, you 
know, let the park, as we call it, for a term of years.” 

“ I shouldn’t mind letting the park,” I answered, “ for a 
little while ; but nothing should ever make me let the dear 
old house. What should I do, if I wanted it to die in ? ” 

The old man smiled, evidently not ill-pleased. “ What do 
you say to the bar ?” he asked. 

“ I would rather not,” I answered. 

“Would you prefer the church?” he asked, eyeing me a 
little doubtfully. 

“ No, certainly uncle,” I answered. “ I should want to be 
surer of a good many things before I dared teach them to 
other people.” 

“lam glad of that, my boy. The fear did cross my mind 


188 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


for a moment, that you might be inclined to take to the 
church as a profession, which seems to me the worst kind of 
infidelity. A thousand times rather would I have you doubt- 
ful about what is to me the highest truth, than regarding it 
with the indiflerence of those who see in it only the prospect 
of a social position and livelihood. Have you any plan of 
your own ?” 

“ I have heard,” I answered circuitously, “ that many bar- 
risters have to support themselves by literary work for years 
before their own profession begin to show them favor. I 
should prefer going in for the writing at once.” 

“ It must be a hard struggle either way,” he replied ; “ but 
I should not leave you without something to fall back upon. 
Tell me what makes you think you could be an author?” 

“ I am afraid it is presumptuous,” I answered, “ but as often 
as I think of what I am to do, that is the first thing that 
occurs to me. I suppose,” I added laughing, “ that the favor 
with which my schoolfellows at Mr. Elder’s used to receive my 
stories, is to blame for it. I used to tell them by the hour 
together.” 

“Well,” said my uncle, “that proves at least that if you 
had anything to say, you might be able to say it ; but I am 
afraid it proves nothing more.” 

“Nothing more, I admit. I only mentioned it to account 
for the notion.” 

“I quite understand you, my boy. Meantime, the best 
thing in any case will be Oxford. I will do what I can to 
make it an easier life for you than I found it.” 

Having heard nothing of Charley Osborne since he left Mr. 
Forest’s, I went one day, very soon after my return, to call on 
Mr. Elder, partly in the hope of learning something about him. 
I found Mrs. Elder unchanged, but could not help fancying a 
difierence in Mr. Elder’s behaviour, which, after finding I could 
draw nothing from him concerning Charley, I attributed to Mr. 
Osborne’s evil report, and returned foiled and vexed. I told 
my uncle, with some circumstance, the whole story ; explain- 
ing how, although unable to combat the doubts which 


ONLY A LINK. 


189 


occasioned Charley’s unhappiness, I had yet always hung to 
the side of believing. 

“ You did right to do no more, my boy,” said my uncle ; 
“and it is clear you have been misunderstood — and ill-used 
besides. But every wrong will be set right some day.” 

My aunt showed me now far more consideration — I do not 
ss^y — than she jelt before. A curious kind of respect mingled 
with her kindness, which seemed a slighter form of the obser- 
vance with which she constantly regarded my uncle. 

My study was pretty hard and continuous. I had no tutor 
to direct me or take any of the responsibility off me. 

I walked to the Hall one morning, to see Mrs. Wilson. 
She was kind, but more stiff even than before. From her I 
learned two things of interest. The first, which beyond mea- 
sure delighted me, was that Charley was at Oxford — ^had been 
there a year. The second was that Clara was at school in Lon- 
don. Mrs. Wilson shut her mouth very primly after answering 
my question concerning her ; and I went no fiirther in that 
direction. I took no trouble to ask her concerning the relation- 
ship of which Mr. Coningham had spoken. I knew already 
from my uncle that it was a fact, but Mrs. Wilson did not 
behave in such a manner as to render me inclined to broach 
the subject. If she wished it to remain a secret from me, she 
should be allowed to imagine it such. 


190 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

CHARLEY AT OXFORD. 

I HAVE no time in this selection and combination of the 
parts of my story which are more especially my history, to 
dwell upon that portion of it which refers to my own life at 
Oxford. I was so much of a student of books while there, and 
had so little to do with any of the men except Charley, that 
save as it bore upon my intellect, Oxford had little special 
share in what life has made of me, and may in the press of 
other matter be left out. Had I time, however, to set forth 
what I know of my own development more particularly, I 
could not pass over the influence of external Oxford, the archi- 
tecture and general surroundings of which I recognized as 
affecting me more than anything I had yet met, with the excep- 
tion of the Swiss mountains, pine-woods and rivers. It is, how- 
ever, imperative to set forth the peculiar character of my rela- 
tion to and intercourse with Charley, in order that what fol- 
lows may be properly understood. 

For no other reason than that my uncle had been there be- 
fore me, I went to Corpus Christi, while Charley was at Exe- 
ter. It was some days before we met, for I had twice failed in 
my attempts to And him. At length, one afternoon, as I entered 
the quadrangle to make a third essay, there he was coming 
towards the gate with a companion. 

When he caught sight of me, he advanced with a quick yet 
hesitating step — a step with a question in it : he was not quite 
sure of me. He was now approaching six feet in height, and 
graceful, though not exactly dignified carriage. His com- 
plexion remained as pale and his eyes as blue as before. The 
pallor flushed and the blue sparkled as he made a few final 
and long strides towards me. The grasp of the hand he gave 
me was powerful, but broken into sudden almost quivering re- 
laxations and compressions. I could not help fancying also 


CHARLEY AT OXFORD. 


191 


that he was using some little effort to keep his eyes steady upon 
mine. Altogether, I was not quite satisfied with our first meet- 
ing, and had a strong impression that if our friendship was to 
be resumed, it was about to begin a new course, not building 
itself exactly on the old foundations, but starting afresh. He 
looked almost on the way to become a man of the world. Per- 
haps, however, the companionship he was in had something to 
do with this, for he was so nervously responsive, that he would 
unconsciously take on for the moment any appearance charac- 
terizing those about him. 

His companion was a little taller, and stouter-built than he ; 
with a bearing and gait of conscious importance, not so marked 
as to be at once offensive. The upper part of his face was fine, 
the nose remarkably so, while the lower part was decidedly 
coarse, the chin too large, and the mouth having little form, 
except in the first movement of utterance, when an unpleasant 
curl took possession of the upper lip, which I afterwards in- 
terpreted as a doubt disguising itself in a sneer. There was 
also in his manner a degree of self-assertion which favored the 
same conclusion. His hands were very large, a pair of merely 
blanched plebeian fists, with thumbs much turned back— and 
altogether ungainly. He wore very tight gloves, and never 
shook hands when he could help it. His feet were scarcely so 
bad in form ; still by no pretence could they be held to indi- 
cate breeding. His manner, where he wished to conciliate, was 
pleasing ; but to me it was overbearing and unpleasant. He 
was the only son of Sir Giles Brotherton, of Mold warp Hall. 
Charley and he did not belong to the same college, but, unlike 
as they were they had somehow taken to each other. I presume 
it was the decision of this manner that attracted the wavering 
nature of Charley, who, with generally active impulses, vras 
yet always in doubt when a moment requiring action arrived. 

Charley, having spoken to me, turned and introduced me to 
his friend. Geoffrey Brotherton merely nodded. 

“ We were at school together in Switzerland,” said Charley. 

“ Yes,” said Geoffrey, in a half-interrogatory, half-assenting 
tone. 


192 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“Till I found your card in my box, I never heard of your 
coming,’^ said Charley. 

“ It was not my fault,” I answered. “ I did what I could to 
find out something about you, but all in vain.” 

“ Paternal precaution, I believe,” he said, with something 
that approached a grimace. 

Now, although I had little special reason to love Mr. Os- 
borne, and knew him to be a tyrant, I knew also that my old 
Charley could not have thus coolly uttered a disrespectful word 
of him ; and I had therefore a painful though at the same time 
an undefined conviction that some degree of moral degeneracy 
must have taken place before he could express himself as now. 
To many, such a remark will appear absurd, but I am confident 
that disrespect for the preceding generation, and especially for 
those in it nearest to ourselves, is a sure sign of relaxing dig- 
nity, and, in any extended manifestation, an equally sure 
symptom of national and political decadence. My reader 
knows, however, that there was much to be said in excuse of 
Charley. 

His friend sauntered away, and we went on talking. My 
heart longed to rest with his for a moment on the past. 

“ I had a dreary time of it after you left, Charley,” I said. 

“ Not so dreary as I had, Wilfrid, I am certain. You had 
at least the mountains to comfort you. Anywhere is better than 
at home, with a meal of Bible oil and vinegar twice a day for 
certain, and a wine-glassful of it now and then in between. 
Damnation’s better than a spoony heaven. To be away from 
home is heaven enough for me.” 

“ But your mother, Charley !” I ventured to say. 

“ My mother is an angel. I could almost be good for her 
sake. But I never could, I never can get near her. My father 
reads every letter she writes before it comes to me — I know that 
by the style of it ; and I’m equally certain he reads every letter 
of mine before it reaches her.” , 

“ Is your sister at home ? ’ 

“ No. She’s at school at Clapham — ^being sand-papered into 
a saint, I suppose.” 


CHARLEY AT OXFORD. 


193 


His mouth twitched and quivered. He was not pleased with 
himself for talking as he did. 

“ Your father means it for the best,” I said. 

I know that. He means his best. If I thought it was 
the best, I should cut my throat and have done with it.” 

“ But, Charley, couldn’t we do something to find out, after 
all?” 

« Find out what, Wilfrid?” 

“ The best thing, you know ; — what we are here for.” 

“ I’m sick of it all, Wilfrid. I’ve tried till I’m sick of it. 
If you should find out anything, you can let me know. I am 
busy trying not to think. I find that quite enough. If I were 
to think, I should go mad.” 

‘‘ Oh, Charley I I can’t bear to hear you talk like that,” 1 
exclaimed ; but there was a glitter in his eye which I did not 
like, and which made me anxious to change the subject. “ Don’t 
you like being here ?” I asked, in sore want of something 
to say. 

“ Yes, well enough,” he replied. “ But I don’t see what’s to 
come of it, for I can’t work. Even if my father were a mil- 
lionaire, I couldn’t go on living on him. The sooner that is 
over, the better I” 

He was looking down, and gnawing at that tremulous upper 
lip. I felt miserable. 

“I wish we were at the same college, Charley!” I said. 

“ It’s better as it is,” he rejoined. “ I should do you no good. 
You go in for reading, I suppose?” 

“ Well, I do. I mean my uncle to have the worth of his 
money.” 

Charley looked no less miserable than I felt. I saw that his 
conscience was speaking, and I knew he was the last in the 
world to succeed in excusing himself. But I understood him 
better than he understood himself, and believed that his idle- 
ness arose from the old unrest, the unweariness of that never 
satisfied questioning which the least attempt at thought was 
sure to awaken. Once invaded by a question, Charley must 
answer it, or fail and fall into a stupor. Not an ode of Horace 
13 


194 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


could he read without finding himself plunged in metaphysics. 
Enamored of repose above all things, he was from every side 
stung to inquiry which seldom indeed afforded what seemed 
solution. Hence, in part at least, it came that he had begun 
to study not merely how to avoid awaking the Sphinx, hut by 
what opiates to keep her stretched supine with her lovely 
woman-face betwixt her fierce lion-paws. This also, no doubt, 
had a share in his becoming the associate of Geoffrey Brother- 
ton, from whose company, if he had been at peace with himself, 
he would have recoded upon the slightest acquaintance. I am 
at some loss to imagine what could have made Geoffrey take 
such a liking to Charley ; but I presume it was the confiding 
air characterizing all Charley’s behaviour that chiefly pleased 
him. He seemed to look upon him with something of the 
tenderness a coarse man may show for a delicate Italian grey- 
hound, fitter to be petted by a lady. 

That same evening Charley came to my rooms. His manner 
was constrained, and yet suggested a whole tide of pent-up 
friendship which, but for some undeclared barrier, would have 
broken out and overflowed our intercourse. After this one 
evening, however, it was some time before I saw him again. 
When I called upon him next he was not at home, nor did he 
come to see me. Again I sought him, but with like failure. 
After a third attempt I desisted, not a little hurt, I confess, but 
not in the least inclined to quarrel with him. I gave myself 
the more diligently to my work. 

And now Oxford began to do me harm. I saw so much 
idleness and so much wrong of all kinds about me, that I began 
to consider myself a fine exception. Because I did my poor 
duty — ^no better than any honest lad must do it — I became 
conceited ; and the manner in which Charley’s new friend treated 
me, not only increased the fault, but aided in the development 
of certain other stems from the same root of self-partiality. 
He never saluted me with other than what I regarded as a 
supercilious nod of the head. When I met him in company 
with Charley, and the latter stopped to speak to me, he would 
walk on without the least change of step. The indignation 


CHARLEY AT OXFORD. 


195 


which this conduct aroused, drove me to think as I had never 
thought before concerning my social position. I found it im- 
possible to define. As I pondered, however, a certainty dawned 
upon me rather than was arrived at by me, that there was 
some secret connected with my descent, upon which bore the 
history of the watch I carried and of the sword I had lost. 
On the mere possibility of something, utterly forgetful that, if 
the secret existed at all, it might be of a very diflerent nature 
from my hopes, I began to build castles innumerable. Per- 
ceiving of course that one of a decayed yeoman family could 
stand no social comparison with the heir to a rich baronetcy, 
I fell back upon absurd imaginings ; and what with the self- 
satisfaction of doing my duty, what with the vanity of my 
baby manhood, and what with the mystery I chose to believe 
in and interpret accordmg to my own desires, I was fast 
sliding into a moral condition contemptible indeed. 

But still my heart was true to Charley. When, after late 
hours of hard reading, I retired at last to my bed, and allowed 
my thoughts to wander where they would, seldom was there a 
night on which they did not turn as of themselves towards the 
memory of our past happiness. I vowed, although Charley 
had forsaken me, to keep his chamber in my heart ever empty, 
and closed against the entrance of another. If ever he 
pleased to return, he should find he had been waited for. I 
believe there was much of self-pity, and of self-approval as 
well, mingling with my regard for him ; but the constancy was 
there notwithstanding, and I regard the love I thus cherished 
for Charley as the chief saving element in my condition at the 
time. 

One night — I cannot now recall with certainty the time or 
season — I only know it was night, and I was reading alone in 
my room — a knock came to the door, and Charley entered. I 
sprang from my seat and bounded to meet him. 

“At last, Charley!’* I exclaimed. 

But he almost pushed me aside, left me to shut the door he 
had opened, sat down in a chair by the fire, and began gnaw- 
ing the head of his cane. I rtsumed my seat, moved the lamp 


196 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


SO that I could see him, and waited for him to speak. Then 
first I saw that his face was unnaturally pale and worn, almost 
even haggard. His eyes were weary, and his whole manner as 
of one haunted by an evil presence of which he is ever aware. 

“ You are an enviable fellow, Wilfrid,” he said at length, 
with something between a groan and a laugh. 

“ Why do you say that, Charley ?” I returned. “ Why am 
I enviable ?” 

“ Because you can work. I hate the very sight of a book. 
I am afraid I shall be plucked. I see nothing else for it. 
And what will the old man say ? I have grace enough left to 
be sorry for him. But he will take it out in sour looks and 
silences.” 

“There’s time enough yet. I wish you were not so far 
ahead of me : we might have worked together.” 

“ I can’t work, I tell you. I hate it. It will console my 
father, I hope, to find his prophecies concerning me come true. 
I’ve heard him abuse me to my mother.” 

“ I wish you wouldn’t talk so of your fether, Charley. It’s 
not like you. I can’t bear to hear it.” 

“ It’s not like what I used to be, Wilfrid. But there’s none 
of that left. What do you take me for? Honestly now?” 

He hung his head low, his eyes fixed on the hearth-rug, not 
on the fire, and kept gnawing at the head of his cane. 

“ I don’t like some of your companions,” I said. “ To be 
sure I don’t know much of them I” 

“The less you know, the better! If there be a devil, that 
fellow Brotherton will hand me over to him — bodily, before 
long.” 

“ Why don’t you give him up ?” I said. 

“ It’s no use trying. He’s got such a hold of me. Never 
let a man you don’t know to the marrow pay even a toll-gate 
for you, Wilfrid.” 

“ I am in no danger, Charley. Such people don’t take to 
me,” I said, self-righteously. “But it can’t be too late to 

break with him. I know my uncle would 1 could manage 

a five-pound note now, I think.” 


CHARLEY AT OXFORD. 


197 


“ My dear boy, if I had borrowed . But I have let 

him pay for me again and again, and I don’t know how to rid 
the obligation. But it don’t signify. It’s too late, anyhow.” 

“ What have you done, Charley ? Nothing very wrong, I 
trust.” 

The lost look deepened. 

“It’s all over, Wilfrid,” he said. “But it don’t matter. I 
can take to the river when I please.” 

“ But then you know you might happen to go right through 
the river, Charley.” 

“ I know what you mean,” he said, with a defiant sound 
like nothing I had ever heard. 

“ Charley !” I cried, “ I can’t bear to hear you. You can’t 
have changed so much already as not to trust me. I will do 
all I can to help you. What have you done ?” 

“ Oh, nothing I” he rejoined, and tried to laugh ; it was a 
dreadful failure. “ But I can’t bear to think of that mother 
of mine ! I wish I could tell you all ; but I can’t. How Bro- 
therton would laugh at me now ! I can’t be made quite like 
other people, Charley ? You would never have been such a 
fool.” 

“ You are more delicately made than most people, Charley, 
— * touched to finer issues,’ as Shakspeare says.” 

“ Who told you that ?” 

“ I think a great deal about you. That is all you have left 
me.” 

“ I’ve been a brute, Wilfrid. But you’ll forgive me, I 
know.” 

“ With all my heart, if you’ll only put it in my power to 
serve you. Come, trust me, Charley, and tell me all about it. 
I shall not betray you.” 

“I’m not afraid of that,” he answered, and sunk into 
silence once more. 

I look to myself presumptuous and priggish in the memory. 
But I did mean truly by him. I began to question him, and 
by slow degrees, in broken hints, and in jets of reply, drew 
from him the facts. When at length he saw that I under- 


198 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


stood, he burst into tears, hid his face in his hands, and 
rocked himself to and fro. 

“ Charley ! Charley ! don’t give in like that,” I cried. “ Be as 
sorry as you like ; but don’t go on as if there was no help. Who 
has not failed and been forgiven — in one v^ay if not in another?” 

“ Who is there to forgive me ? My father would not. And 
if he would, what difference would it make ? I have done it 
all the same.” 

“ But God, Charley ” I suggested, hesitating. 

“ What of him ? K he should choose to pass a thing by 
and say nothing about it, that doesn’t undo it. It’s all 
nonsense. God himself can’t make it that I didn’t do what I 
did do.” 

But with what truthful yet reticent words can I convey 
the facts of Charley’s case? I am perfectly aware it would be 
to expose both myself and him to the laughter of men of low 
development who behave as if no more self-possession were de- 
manded of a man than of one of the lower animals. Such 
might perhaps feel a certain involuntary movement of pitiful- 
ness at the fate of a woman first awaking to the consciousness 
that she can no more hold up her head amongst her kind : 
but that a youth should experience a similar sense of degra- 
dation and loss, they would regard as a degree of silliness and 
effeminacy below contempt if not beyond belief. But there is 
a sense of personal purity belonging to the man as well as to 
the woman ; and although I dare not say that in the most re- 
fined of masculine natures it asserts itself with the awful 
majesty with which it makes its presence known in the heart 
of a woman, the man in whom it speaks with authority is to 
be found amongst the worthiest ; and to a youth like Charley 
the result of actual offence against it might be utter ruin. In 
his case, however, it was not merely a consciousness of 
personal defilement which followed; for, whether his com- 
panions had so schemed it or not, he supposed himself more 
than ordinarily guilty. 

“ I suppose I must marry the girl,” said poor Charley, with 
a groan. 


CHARLEY AT OXFORD. 


199 


Happily I saw at once that there might be two sides to the 
question, and that it was desirable to know more ere I ven- 
tured a definite reply. 

I had grown up, thanks to many things, with a most real 
although vague adoration of women ; but I was not so igno- 
rant as to be unable to fancy it possible that Charley had 
been the victim. Therefore, after having managed to comfort 
him a little, and taking him home to his rooms, I set about 
endeavoring to get further information. 

I will not linger over the afiair — ^as unpleasant to myself as 
it can be to any of my readers. It had to be mentioned, how- 
ever, not merely as explaining how I got hold of Charley 
again, but as affording a clew to his character, and so to his 
history. Not even yet can I think without a gush of anger 
and shame of my visit to Brotherton. With what stammer- 
ing confusion I succeeded at last in making him understand 
the nature of the information I wanted, I will not attempt to 
describe — ^nor the roar of laughter which at length burst bel- 
lowing— not from himself only, but from three or four com- 
panions as well to whom he turned and communicated the 
joke. The fire of jests, and proposals, and interpretations of 
motive which I had then to endure, seems yet to scorch my 
very brain at the mere recollection. From their manner and 
speech I was almost convinced that they had laid a trap for 
Charley, whom they regarded as a simpleton, to enjoy his con- 
sequent confusion. With what I managed to find out else- 
where, I was at length satisfied, and happily succeeded in con- 
vincing Charley, that he had been the butt of his companions, 
and that he was far the more injured person in any possible 
aspect of the affair. 

I shall never forget the look or the sigh of relief which 
proved that at last his mind had opened to the facts of the 
case. 

“Wilfrid,” he said, “you have saved me. We shall never 
be parted more. See if I am ever Mse to you again I” 

And yet it never was as it had been. I am sure of that 
now. 


200 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Henceforth, however, he entirely avoided his former com- 
panions. Our old friendship was renewed. Our old talks 
arose again. And now that he was not alone in them, the 
perplexities under which he had broken down when left to en- 
counter them by himself, were not so overwhelming as to 
render him helpless. We read a good deal together, and 
Charley helped me much in the finer affairs of the classics, for 
his perceptions were as delicate as his feelings. He would 
brood over a Horatian phrase as Keats would brood over a 
sweet pea or a violet ; the very tone in which he would repeat 
it would waft me from it an aroma unperceived before. When 
it was his turn to come to my rooms, I would watch for his 
arrival almost as a lover for his mistress. 

For two years more our friendship grew ; in which time 
Charley had recovered habits of diligence. I presume he 
said nothing at home of the renewal of his intimacy with me ; 
I shrunk from questioning him. As if he had been an angel 
who had hurt his wing and was compelled to sojourn with me 
for a time, I feared to bring the least shadow over his face, 
and indeed fell into a restless observance of his moods. I 
remember we read “ Comus ” together. How his face would 
glow at the impassioned praises of virtue ! and how the glow 
would die into a gray sadness at the recollection of the near 
past I I could read his face like a book. 

At length the time arrived when we had to part — he to 
study for the bar, I to remain at Oxford another year, still 
looking forward to a literary life. 

When I commenced writing my story, I fancied myself so 
far removed from it that I could regard it as the story of 
another, capable of being viewed on all sides, and conjectured 
and speculated upon. And so I found it, so long as the 
regions of childhood and youth detained me. But as I 
approach the middle scenes, I begin to fear the revival of the 
old torture; that from the dispassionate reviewer I may 
become once again the suffering actor. Long ago I read a 
strange story of a man condemned at periods unforeseen to 
act again and yet again in absolute verisimilitude each of the 


CHARLEY AT OXFORD. 


201 


scenes of his former life ; I have a feeling as if I too might 
glide from the present into the past without a sign to warn me 
of the coming transition. 

One word more ere I pass to the middle events, those for 
the sake of which the beginning is and the end shall be 
recorded. It is this — that I am under endless obligation to 
Charley for opening my eyes at this time to my overweening 
estimate of myself. Not that he spoke — Charley could never 
have reproved even a child. But I could tell almost pny 
sudden feeling that passed through him. His face betrayed 
it. What he felt about me I saw at once. From the signs 
of his mind, I often recognized the character of what was in 
my own; and thus seeing myself through him, I gathered 
reason to be ashamed ; while the refinement of his criticism, 
the quickness of his perception, and the novelty and force of 
his remarks convinced me that I could not for a moment com- 
pare with him in mental gifts. The upper hand of influence 
I had over him I attribute to the greater freedom of my 
training, and the enlarged ideas which had led my uncle to 
avoid enthralling me to his notions. He believed the truth 
could afford to wait until I was capable of seeing it for 
myself ; and that the best embodiments of truth are but 
bonds and fetters to him who cannot accept them as such. 
When I could not agree with him, he would say, with one of 
his fine smiles, “ We’ll drop it then, Willie. I don’t believe 
you have caught my meaning. If I am right, you will see it 
some day, and there’s no hurry.” How could it be but 
Charley and I should be different, seeing we had fared so 
differently? But alas I my knowledge of his character is 
chiefly the result of after-thought. 

I do not mean this manuscript to be read until after my 
death; and even then, — although partly from habit, partly 
that I dare not trust myself to any other form of utterance, 
I write as if for publication, — even then, I say, only by one. 
I am about to write what I should not die in peace if I 
thought she would never know ; but which I dare not seek to 
tell her now for the risk of being misunderstood. I thank 


202 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


God for that blessed invention, Death, which of itself must 
set many things right ; and gives a man a chance of justifying 
himself where he would not have been heard while alive. 
But lest my manuscript should fall into other hands, I have 
taken care that not a single name in it should contain even a 
side look or hint at the true one. She will be able to under- 
stand the real person by almost every one of them. 


MY WHITE MAKE. 


203 


CHAPTER XXV. 

MY WHITE MARE. 

I PASSED my final examinations with credit, if not with 
honor. It was not yet clearly determined what I should do 
next. My goal was London, but I was unwilling to go 
thither empty-handed. I had been thinking as well as read- 
ing a good deal; a late experience had stimulated my 
imagination ; and at spare moments I had been writing a tale. 
It had grown to a considerable mass of manuscript, and I was 
anxious, before going, to finish it. Hence, therefore, I 
returned home with the intention of remaining there quietly 
for a few months before setting out to seek my fortune. 

Whether my uncle in his heart quite favored the plan, I 
have my doubts, but it would have been quite inconsistent 
with his usual grand treatment of me to oppose anything not 
wrong on which I had set my heart. Finding now that I 
took less exercise than he thought desirable, and kept myself 
too much to my room, he gave me a fresh proof of his un- 
varying kindness. He bought me a small gray mare of 
strength and speed. Her lineage was unknown ; but her 
small head, broad fine chest, and clean limbs, indicated Arab 
blood at no great remove. Upon her I used to gallop over 
the fields, or saunter along the lanes, dreaming and inventing. 

And now certain feelings, too deeply rooted in my nature 
for my memory to recognize their beginnings, began to assume 
color and condensed form, as if about to burst into some kind 
of blossom. Thanks to my education and love of study, also 
to a self-respect undefined, yet restraining, nothing had 
occurred to wrong them. In my heart of hearts I worshipped 
the idea of womanhood. I thank Heaven, if ever I do 
thank for anything, that I still worship thus. Alas! how 
many have put on the acolyte’s robe in the same temple, who 


204 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


have ere long cast dirt upon the statue of their divinity, then 
dragged her as defiled from her lofty pedestal, and left her 
lying dishonored at its foot ! Instead of feeding with holy oil 
the lamp of the higher instinct, which would glorify and 
purify the lower, they feed the fire of the lower with vile fuel, 
which sends up its stinging smoke to becloud and blot the 
higher. 

One lovely spring morning, the buds half out, and the wind 
blowing fresh and strong, the white clouds scudding across a 
blue gulf of sky, and the tall trees far away swinging as of 
old, when they churned the wind for my childish fancy, I 
looked up from my book and saw it all. The gladness of 
nature entered into me, and my heart swelled so in my bosom 
that I turned with distaste from all further labor. I pushed 
my papers from me, and went to the window. The short 
grass all about was leaning away fi’om the wind, shivering 
and showing its enameL Still, as in childhood, the wind had 
a special power over me. In another moment I was out of 
the house and hastening to the farm for my mare. She 
neighed at the sound of my step. I saddled and bridled her, 
sprang on her back, and galloped across the grass in the 
direction of the trees. 

In a few moments I was within the lodge gates, walking my 
mare along the graveled drive, and with the reins on the 
white curved neck before me, looking up at those lofty pines 
whose lonely heads were swinging in the air like floating but 
fettered islands. My head had begun to feel dizzy with the 
ever-iterated, slow, half-circular sweep, when just opposite the 
lawn, stretching from a low wire fence up to the door of the 
steward's house, my mare shied, darted to the other side of 
the road, and flew across the grass. Caught thus lounging on 
my saddle, I was almost unseated. As soon as I had pulled 
her up, I turned to see what had startled her, for the im- 
pression of a white flash remained upon my mental sensorium. 
There, leaning on the little gate, looking much diverted, stood 
the loveliest creature, in a morning dress of white, which the 
wind was bloAving about her like a cloud. She had no hat on. 


MY WHITE MARE. 


205 


Jind her hair, as if eager to join in the merriment of the day, 
was flying like the ribbons of a tattered sail. A humanized 
Dryad I - one that had been caught young, but in whom the 
forest-sap still asserted itself in wild aflhiities with the wind 
and the swaying branches, aud the white clouds careering 
across I Could it be Clara ? How could it be any other than 
Clara ? I rode back. 

I was a little short-sighted, and had to get pretty near 
before I could be certain ; but she knew me, and waited my 
approach. When I came near enough to see them, I could 
not mistake those violet eyes. 

I was now in my twentieth year, and had never been in love. 
Whether I now fell in love or not, I leave to my reader. 

Clara was even more beautiful than her girlish loveliness 
had promised. “ An exceeding fair forehead,” to quote Sir 
Philip Sidney; eyes of which I have said enough; a nose 
more delicate than symmetrical ; a mouth rather thin-lipped, 
but well curved ; a chin rather small, I confess ; — ^but did 
any one ever from the most elaborated description acquire even 
an approximate idea of the face intended? Her person was 
lithe and graceful ; she had good hands and feet ; and the fair- 
ness of her skin gave her brown hair a duskier look than 
belonged to itself. 

Before I was yet near enough to be certain of her, I lifted 
my hat, and she returned the salutation with an almost fami- 
liar nod and smile. 

“I am very sorry,” she said, speaking first — in her old 
half-mocking way, “ that I so nearly cost you your seat.” 

“ It was my own carelessness,” I returned. “ Surely I am 
right in taking you for the lady who allowed me, in old times, 
to call her Clara. How I could ever have had the presump- 
tion I cannot imagine.” 

“ Of course that is a familiarity not to be thought of be- 
tween full-grown people like us, Mr. Curabermede,” she 
rejoined, and her smile became a laugh. 

“ Ah, you do recognize me then?” I said, thinking her cool, 
feat forgetting the thought the next moment. 


206 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I guess at you. If you had been dressed as on one occa- 
sion, I should not have got so far as that.” 

Pleased at this merry reference to our meeting on the Wen- 
gern Alp, I was yet embarrassed to find that nothing more 
suggested itself to be said. But while I was quieting my 
mare, which happily afibrded me some pretext at the moment, 
another voice fell on my ear — hoarse, but breezy and pleasant. 

“ So, Clara, you are no sooner back to old quarters than you 
give a rendezvous at the garden gate — eh, girl ?” 

“ Bather an ill-chosen spot for the purpose, papa,” she Te- 
tumed, laughing, especially as the gentleman has too much 
to do with his horse to get ofi* and talk to me.” 

“ Ah ! our old friend, Mr. Cumbermede, I declare ! — Only 
rather more of him !” he added, laughing, as he opened the 
little gate in the wire fence, and coming up to me shook hands 
heartily. “ Delighted to see you, Mr. Cumbermede. Have 
you left Oxford for good ?” 

Yes,” I answered — “ some time ago.” 

“ And may I ask what you’re turning your attention to 
now ?” 

“ Well, I hardly like to confess it, but I mean to have a try 
at — something in the literary way.” 

‘‘ Plucky enough ! The paths of literature are not certainly 
the paths of pleasantness or of peace even — so far as ever I 
heard. Somebody said you were going in for the law.” 

“ I thought there were too many lawyers already. One so 
often hears of barristers with nothing to do, and glad to take 
to the pen, that I thought it might be better to begin with 
what I should most probably come to at last.” 

** Ah ! but Mr. Cumbermede, there are departments of the 
law which bring quicker returns than the bar. If you would 
put yourself in my hands now, you should be earning your 
bread at least within a couple of years or so.” 

‘‘ You are very kind,” I returned heartily, for he spoke as 
if he meant what he said ; “ but you see I have a leaning to 
the one and not to the other. I should like to have a try first, 
at all events.” 


MY WHITE MARE. 207 

** Well, perhaps it’s better to begin by following your bent. 
You may find the road take a turn, though.” 

“ Perhaps, I will go till it does, though.” 

While we talked Clara had followed her father, and was 
now patting my mare’s neck with a nice, plump, fair-fingered 
hand. The creature stood with her arched neck and small 
head turned lovingly towards her. 

“ What a nice white thing you have got to ride !” she said. 
“ I hope it is your own.” 

“Why do you hope that?” I asked. 

“ Because it’s best to ride your own horse, isn’t it ?” she 
answered, looking up naively. 

“ Would you like to ride her ? I believe she has carried a 
lady, though not since she came into my possession.” 

Instead of answering me she looked round at her father, 
who stood by smiling benignantly. Her look said — 

“ If papa would let me.” 

He did not reply, but seemed waiting. I resumed. 

“ Are you a good horsewoman, Miss Clara?” I said, 

with a feel after the recovery of old privileges. 

“I must not sing my own praises, Mr. Wilfrid,” she re- 

joined, “ but I have ridden in Rotten Row, and I believe with- 
out any signal disgrace.” 

“ Have you got a side-saddle ?” I asked, dismounting. 

Mr. Coningham spoke now. 

“ Don’t you think Mr. Cumbermede’s horse a little too 
frisky for you, Clara ? I know so little about you, I can’t teU 

what you’re fit for. She used to ride pretty well as a girl,” 

he added turning to me. 

“ I’ve not forgotten that,” I said. “ I shall walk by her 
side, you know.” 

“ Shall you ?” she said, with a sly look. 

“ Perhaps,” I suggested, “ your grandfather would let me 
have his horse, and then we might have a gallop across the 
park.” 

“ The best way,” said Mr. Coningham, “ will be to let the 
gardener take your horse, while you come in and have some 


208 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


luncheon. We’ll see about the mount after that. My horse 
has to carry me back in the evening, else I should be happy 
to join you. She’s a fine creature, that of yours.” 

‘‘ She’s the handiest creature !” I said — “ a little skittish, 
but very affectionate, and has a fine mouth. Perhaps she 
ought to have a curb-bit for you, though, Miss Clara.” 

“ We’ll manage with the snaffle,” she answered with, I 
thought, another sly glance at me, out of eyes sparkling with 
suppressed merriment and expectation I Her father had gone 
to find the gardener, and as we stood waiting for him, she still 
stroked the mare’s neck. 

“ Are you not afraid of taking cold,” I said, ** without your 
bonnet ?” 

“ I never had a cold in my life,” she returned. 

“ That is saying much. You would have me believe you 
are not made of the same clay as other people.” 

“ Believe anything you like,” she answered carelessly. 

“Then I do believe it,” I rejoined. 

She looked me in the face, took her hand from the mare’s 
neck, stepped back half-a-foot, and looked round, saying : 

“ I wonder where that man can have got to. Oh, here he 
comes, and papa with him I” 

We went across the trim little lawn, which lay waiting for 
the warmer weather to burst into a profusion of roses, and 
through a trellised porch entered a shadowy little hall, with 
heads of stags and foxes, an old-fashioned glass-doored book- 
case, and hunting and riding-whips, whence we passed into a 
low-pitched drawing-room, redolent of dried rose-leaves and 
fresh hyacinths. A little pug-dog, which seemed to have failed 
in swallowing some big dog’s tongue, jumped up barking from 
the sheepskin mat, where he lay before the fire. 

“ Stupid pug I” said Clara. “ You never know friends 
from foes I I wonder where my aunt is.” 

She left the room. Her father had not followed us. I sat 
down on the sofa, and began turning over a pretty book bound 
in red silk, one of the first of the annual tribe, which lay on 
the table. I was deep in one of its eastern stories when, hear* 


MY WHITE MARE. 


209 


ing a slight movement, I looked up, and there sat Clara in a 
low chair by the window, working at a delicate bit of lace 
with a needle. She looked somehow as if she had been there an 
hour at least. I laid down the book with some exclamation. 

“ What is the matter, Mr. Cumbermede?” she asked, with the 
slightest possible glance up from the fine meshes of her work. 

“ I had not the slightest idea you were in the room.” 

“ Of course not. How could a literary man with a Forget- 
me-not in his hand be expected to know that a girl had come 
into the room ?” 

“ Have you been at school all this time ?” I asked, for the 
sake of avoiding a silence. 

“ All what time ?” 

“ Say, since we parted in Switzerland.” 

‘‘ Not quite. I have been staying with an aunt for nearly 
a year. Have you been at college all this time ?” 

“ At school and college. When did you come home ?” 

“ This is not my home, but I came here yesterday.” 

‘‘ Don’t you find the country dull after London ?” 

“ I haven’t had time yet.” 

“ Did they give you riding lessons at school ?” 

“ No. But my aunt took care of my morals in that respect. 
A girl might as well not be able to dance as ride nowadays.” 

“ Who rode with you in the park ? Not the riding-master?’* 

With a slight flush on her face she retorted, 

“ How many more questions are you going to ask me. I 
should like to know, that I may make up my mind how 
many of them to answer.” 

“ Suppose we say six.” 

“ Very well,” she replied. “ Now I shall answer your last 
question and count that the first. About nine o’clock, 
one day ” 

“ Morning or evening ?” I asked. 

“Morning, of course — I walked out of the house ” 

“ Your aunt’s house ?” 

“ Yes, of course, my aunt’s house. Do let me go on with 

my story. It was getting a little dark, ” 

14 


210 


WILFEID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Getting dark at nine in the morning T* 

“ In the evening, I said.” 

“ I beg your pardon, I thought you said the morning.” 

“ No, no, the evening ; — and of course I was a little 
frightened, for I was not accustomed ” 

“ But you was never out alone at that hour, — in London ?” 

“ Yes, I was quite alone. I had promised to meet — a friend 
at the corner of You know that part, do you?” 

“ I beg your pardon. What part ?” 

“ Oh Mayfair. You know Mayfair, don’t you ?” 

“You were going to meet a gentleman at the corner of 
Mayfair — were you ?” I said, getting quite bewildered. 

She jumped up, clapping her hands as gracefully as 
merrily, and crying — 

“ I wasn’t going to meet any gentleman. There ! Your 
six questions are answered. I won’t answer a single other 
you choose to ask, except I please, which is not in the least 
likely.” 

She made me a low half-merry half-mocking courtesy, and 
left the room. 

The same moment her father came in, following old Mr. 
Coningham, who gave me a kindly welcome, and said his 
horse was at my service, but he hoped I would lunch with him 
first. I gratefully consented, and soon luncheon was an- 
nounced. Miss Coningham, Clara’s aunt, was in the dining- 
room before us. A dry, antiquated woman, she greeted me 
with unexpected frankness. Lunch was half over before 
Clara entered — in a perfectly fitting habit, her hat on, and 
her skirt thrown over her arm. 

“Soho, Clara!” cried her father; “you want to take us by 
surprise — coming out all at once a town-bred lady, eh ?” 

“ Why, where ever did you get that riding-habit, Clara ?” 
said her aunt. 

“ In my box, aunt,” said Clara. 

“ My word, child, but your father has kept you in pocket- 
money !” returned Miss Coningham. 

“ I’ve got a town-aunt as well as a country one,” rejoined 


MY WHITE MARE. 211 

Clara, with an expression I could not quite understand, but 
out of which her laugh took only half the sting. 

Miss Coningham reddened a little. I judged afterwards 
that Clara had been diplomatically allowing her just to feel 
what sharp claws she had for use if required. 

But the effect of the change from loose white muslin to 
tight dark cloth was marvellous, and I was bewitched by it. 
So slight yet so round, so trim yet so pliant — she was grace 
itself. It seemed as if the former object of my admiration 
had vanished, and I had found another with such surpassing 
charms that the loss could not be regretted. I may just men- 
tion that the change appeared also to bring out a certain look 
of determination which I now recalled as having belonged to 
her when a child. 

“ Clara !” said her father in a very marked tone ; where- 
upon it was Clara’s turn to blush and be silent. 

I started some new subject, in the airiest manner I could 
command. Clara recovered her composure, and I flattered 
myself she looked a little grateful when our eyes met. But I 
caught her father’s eyes twinkling now and then as if from 
some secret source of merriment, and could not help fancying 
he was more amused than displeased with his daughter. 


212 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

A RIDING LESSON. 

By the time luncheon was over, the horses had been stand- 
ing some minutes at the lawn gate, my mare with a side-saddle. 
We hastened to mount, Clara’s eyes full of expectant frolic. 
I managed, as I thought, to get before her father, and had the 
pleasure of lifting her to the saddle. She was up ere I could 
feel her weight on my arm. When I gathered her again with 
my eyes, she was seated as calmly as if at her lace needle- 
work, only her eyes were sparkling. With the slightest help, 
she had her foot in the stirrup, and with a single movement 
had her skirt comfortable. I left her to mount the horse they 
had brought me, and when I looked from his back, the white 
mare was already flashing across the boles of the trees, and 
Clara’s dark skirt flying out behind like the drapery of a de- 
scending goddess in an allegorical picture. , With a pang of 
terror I fancied the mare had run away with her, and sat for 
a moment afraid to follow, lest the sound of my horse’s feet 
on the turf should make her gallop the faster. But the next 
moment she turned in her saddle, and I saw a face alive with 
pleasure and confidence. As she recovered her seat, she 
waved her hand to me, and I put my horse to his speed. I 
had not gone far, however, before I perceived a fresh cause of 
anxiety. She was making straight for a wire fence. I had 
heard that horses could not see such a fence, and, if Clara did 
not see it, or should be careless, the result would be frightful. 
I shouted after her, but she took no heed. Fortunately, how- 
ever, there was right in front of them a gate, which I had not 
at first observed, into the bars of which had been wattled 
some brushwood. “ The mare will see that,” I said to myself. 


A RIDING LESSON. 


213 


But the words were hardly through my mind before I saw 
them fly over it like a bird. 

On the other side she pulled up and waited for me. 

Now I had never jumped a fence in my life. I did not 
know that my mare could do such a thing, for I had never 
given her the chance. I was not, and never have become, 
what would be considered an accomplished horseman. I 
scarcely know a word of stable-slang. I have never followed 
the hounds more than twice or three times in the course of my 
life. Not the less am I a true lover of horses — ^but I have 
been their companion more in work than in play. I have 
slept for miles on horseback, but even now I have not a sure 
seat over a fence. 

I knew nothing of the animal I rode, but I was boimd at 
least to make the attempt to follow my leader. I was too 
inexperienced not to put him to his speed instead of going 
gently up to the gate ; and I had a bad habit of leaning for- 
ward in my saddle, besides knowing nothing of how to incline 
myself backwards as the horse alighted. Hence, when I 
found myself on the other side, it was not on my horse’s back, 
but on my own face. I rose uninjured, except in my self- 
esteem. I fear I was for the moment as much disconcerted as 
if I had been guilty of some moral fault. Nor did it help 
me much towards regaining my composure that Clara was 
shaking with suppressed laughter. Utterly stupid from morti- 
fication, I laid hold of my horse, which stood waiting for me 
beside the mare, and scrambled upon his back. But Clara, 
who, with all her fiin, was far from being ill-natured, fancied 
from my silence that I was hurt. Her merriment vanished. 
With quite an anxious expression on her face, she drew to my 
side, saying, 

“ I hope you are not hurt 

“ Only my pride ?” I answered. 

“ Never mind that,” she returned gaily. “ That will soon 
be itself again.” 

“I’m not so sure,” I rejoined. “To make such a fool 
of myself before you /” 


214 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


‘‘ Am I such a formidable person ?” she said. 

“ Yes,” I answered. “ But I never jumped a fence in my 
life before.” 

“ If you had been afraid,” she said, “ and had pulled up, I 
might have despised you. As it was, I only laughed at you. 
Where was the harm ? You shirked nothing. You followed 
your leader. Come along, I will give you a lesson or two 
before we get back.” 

“ Thank you,” I said, beginning to recover my spirits a little; 
“I shall be a most obedient pupil. But how did you get so 
clever, Clara?” 

I ventured the unprotected name, and she took no notice of 
the liberty. 

“I told you I had had a riding-master. If you are not 
afraid, and mind what you are told, you wiU always come right 
somehow.” 

I suspect that is good advice for more than horsemanship.” 

“ I had not the slightest intention of moralizing. I am in- 
capable of it,” she answered, in a tone of serious self-defence. 

“ I had as little intention of making the accusation,” I re- 
joined. “But will you really teach me a little?” 

“Most willingly. To begin. You must sit erect. You lean 
forward.” 

“ Thank you. Is this better?” 

“Yes, better. A little more yet. You ought to have your 
stirrups shorter. It is a poor affectation to ride like a trooper. 
Their own officers don’t. You can tell any novice by his long 
leathers, his heels down and his toes in the stirrups. Bide 
home, if you want to ride comfortably.” 

This phrase was new to me, but I guessed what she meant, 
and without dismounting, pulled my stirrup-leathers a couple 
of holes shorter, and thrust my feet through to the instep. She 
watched the whole proceeding. 

“ There ! you look more like riding now,” she said. “ Let us 
have another canter. I will promise not to lead you over any 
more fences without due warning.” 

“ And due admonition as well, I trust, Clara.” 


A RIDING LESSON. 


215 


She nodded, and away we went. I had never been so proud 
of my mare. She showed to much advantage, with the grace- 
ful figure on her back, which she carried like a feather. 

“ Now there’s a little fence,” she said, pointing where a rail 
or two protected a clump of plantation. “ You must mind the 
young wood though, or we shall get into trouble. Mind you 
throw yourself back a little — as you see me do.” 

I watched her, and following her directions, did better this 
time, for I got over somehow and recovered my seat. 

“ There ! You improve,” said Clara. “ Now we’re pounded, 
except you can jump again, and it is not quite so easy from 
this side.” 

When we alighted, I found my saddle in the proper place. 

“ Bravo !” she cried. “ I entirely forgive your first misad- 
venture. You do splendidly.” 

“ I would rather you forgot it, Clara,” I cried ungallantly. 

“Well, I will be generous,” she returned. “ Besides, I owe 
you something for such a charming ride. I will forget it.” 

“ Thank you,” I said, and drawing closer would have laid 
my left hand on her right. 

Whether she foresaw my intention, I do not know; but in a 
moment she was yards away, scampering over the grass. My 
horse could never have overtaken hers. 

By the time she drew rein and allowed me to get alongside 
of her once more, we were in sight of Mold warp Hall. It stood 
with one corner towards us, giving the prospective of two sides 
at once. She stopped her mare, and said, 

“There, Wilfrid! What would you give to call a place like 
that your own ? What a thing to have a house like that to 
live in 1” 

“ I know something I should like better,” I returned. 

I assure my reader I was not so silly as to be on the point 
of making her an offer already. Neither did she so misunder- 
stand me. She was very near the mark of my meaning when 
she rejoined, 

“ Do you ? I don’t. I suppose you would prefer being called 
a fine poet, or something of the sort,” 


216 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I was glad she did not give me time to reply, for I had not 
intended to expose myself to her ridicule. She was off again 
at a gallop towards the Hall, straight for the less accessible of 
the two gates, and had scrambled the mare up to the very bell- 
pull and rung it before I could get near her. When the porter 
appeared in the wicket — 

“ Open the gate, Jansen,” she said. “ I want to see Mrs. 
Wilson, and I don’t want to get down.” 

“ But horses never come in here. Miss,” said the man. 

“ I mean to make an exception in favor of this mare,” she 
answered. 

The man hesitated a moment, then retreated — but only to 
obey, as we understood at once by the creaking of the dry 
hinges, which were seldom required to move. 

“ You won’t mind holding her for me, will you ?” she said, 
turning to me. 

I had been sitting mute with surprise both at the way in 
which she ordered the man, and at his obedience. But now I 
found my tongue. 

“ Don’t you think. Miss Coningham,” I said — for the man 
was within hearing, “ we had better leave them both with the 
porter, and then we could go in together ? I’m not sure that 
those flags, not to mention the steps, are good footing for that 
mare.” 

“ Oh ! you’re afraid of your animal, are you ?” she rejoined. 
“ Very well. Shall I hold your stirrup for you ?” 

Before I could dismount she had slipped off, and begun 
gathering up her skirt. The man came and took the horses. 
We entered by the open gate together. 

“How can you be so cruel, Clara?” I sajd. “You vdll 
always misinterpret me ! I was quite right about the flags. 
Don’t you see how hard they are, and how slippery therefore 
for iron shoes ?” 

“You might have seen by this time that I know quite as 
much about horses as you do,” she returned, a little cross, I 
thought. 

“ You can ride ever so much better,” I answered ; “ but it 


A RIDING LESSON. 


217 


does not follow you know more about horses than I do. I once 
saw a horse have a frightful fall on just such a pavement. Be- 
sides, does one think only of the horse when there’s an angel 
on his back 

It was a silly speech, and deserved rebuke. 

“I’m not in the least fond of such compliments/^ she 
answered. 

By this time we had reached the door of Mrs. Wilson’s 
apartment. She received us rather stiffly, even for her. After 
some common-place talk, in which, without departing from 
facts, Clara made it appear that she had set out for the express 
purpose of paying Mrs. Wilson a visit, I asked if the family 
was at home, and finding they were not, begged leave to walk 
into the librj.,ry. 

“ We’ll go together,^^ she said, apparently not caring about a 
tete-d tete with Clara. Evidently the old lady liked her as little 
as ever. 

We left the house, and entering again by a side door, passed 
on our way through the little gallery, into which I had dropped 
from the roof. 

“ Look, Clara, that is where I came down,^^ I said. 

She merely nodded. But Mrs. Wilson looked very sharply, 
first at the one, then at the other of us. When we reached the 
library, I found it in the same miserable condition as before, 
and could not help exclaiming, with some indignation ; 

“It ts a shame to see such treasures mouldering there! I 
am confident there are many valuable books among them, 
getting ruined from pure neglect. I wish I knew Sir Giles. I 
would ask him to let me come and set them right.^^ 

“You would be choked with dust and cobwebs in an hour’s 
time,” said Clara. “ Besides, I don’t think Mrs. Wilson would 
like the proceeding.” 

“ What do you ground that remark upon, Miss Clara ?” said 
the housekeeper, in a dry tone. 

“ I thought you used them for firewood occasionally,” an- 
swered Clara, with an innocent expression both of manner and 
voice. 


218 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


The most prudent answer to such an absurd charge would 
have been a laugh ; but Mrs. Wilson vouchsafed no reply at 
all, and I pretended to be too much occupied with its subject 
to have heard it. 

After lingering a little while, during which I paid attention 
chiefly to Mrs. Wilson, drawing her notice to the state of 
several of the books, I proposed we should have a peep at the 
armory. We went in, and, glancing over the walls I knew so 
well, I scarcely repressed an exclamation : I could not be mis- 
taken in my own sword ! There it hung, in the centre of the 
principal space — ^in the same old sheath, split half way up from 
the point ! To the hilt hung an ivory label with a number 
upon it. I suppose I made some inarticulate sound, for Clara 
fixed her eyes upon me. I busied myself at once with a gor- 
geously hilted scimitar which hung near, for I did not wish to 
talk about it then, and so escaped further remark. From the 
armory we went to the picture-gallery, where I found a good 
many pictures had been added to the collection. They were 
all new, and mostly brilliant in color. I was no judge, but I 
could not help feeling how crude and harsh they looked beside 
the mellowed tints of the paintings, chiefiy portraits, amongst 
which they had been introduced. 

“ Horrid ! — aren’t they ?” said Clara, as if she divined my 
thoughts ; but I made no direct reply, unwilling to ofiend Mrs. 
Wilson. 

When we were once more on horseback, and walking across 
the grass, my companion was the first to speak. 

“ Did you ever see such daubs ?” she said, making a wry face 
as at somethmg sour enough to untune her nerves. ** Those 
new pictures are simply frightful. Any one of them would 
give me the jaundice in a week, if it were hung in our draw- 
mg-room.” 

“ I can’t say I admire them,” I returned. “ And at all 
events they ought not to be on the same walls with those stately 
old ladies and gentlemen.” 

“ Parvenus,” said Clara. “ Quite in their place. Pure Man- 
chester taste — educated on calico-prints,” 


A RIDING LESSON. 


219 


“ If that is your opinion of the family, how do you account 
for their keeping everything so much in the old style? They 
don’t seem to change anything.” 

“ All for their own honor and glory ! The place is a testi- 
mony to the antiquity of the family, of which they are a shoot 
run to seed — and very ugly seed too ! It’s enough to break 
one’s heart to think of such a glorious old place in such hands. 
Did you ever see young Brotherton ?” 

“ I knew him a little at college. He’s a good-looking fellow.” 

‘‘Would be, if it weren’t for the bad blood in him. That 
comes out unmistakably. He’s vulgar.” 

“ Have you seen much of him, then ?” 

“ Quite enough. I never heard him say anything vulgar, or 
saw him do anything vulgar, but vulgar he is, and vulgar is 
every one of the family. A man who is always aware of how 
rich he will be, and how good-looking he is, and what a fine 
match he would make, would look vulgar lying in his coffin.” 

“You are positively caustic. Miss Coningham.” 

“ If you saw their house in Cheshire ! But blessings be on 
the place ! — it’s the safety-valve for Mold warp Hall. The 
natural Manchester passion for novelty and luxury finds a 
vent there, otherwise they could not keep their hands off it; 
and what was best would be sure to go first. Corchester House 
ought to be secured to the family by Act of Parliament.” 

“ Have you been to Corchester, then ?” 

“ I was there for a week once.” 

“ And how did you like it ?” 

“ Not at all. I was not comfortable. I was always feeling 
too well bred. You never saw such colors in your life. Their 
drawing-rooms are quite a happy family of the most quarrel- 
some tints.” 

“ How ever did they come into this property?” 

“They’re of the breed, somehow — a long way off though. 
Shouldn’t I like to see a new claimant come up and oust them 
after all ! They haven’t had it above five-and-twenty years, or 
so. Wouldn’t you ?” 

“ The old man was kind to me once.” 


220 


WELFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ How was that ? I thought it was only through Mrs. Wil- 
son you knew anything of them.” 

I told her the story of the apple. 

“Well, I do rather like old Sir Giles,” she said, when I had 
done. “ There’s a good deal of the' rough country gentleman 
about him. He’s a better man than his son, anyhow. Sons 
will succeed fathers though, unfortunately.” 

“ I don’t care who may succeed him, if only I could get 
back my sword. It’s too bad, with an armory like that, to 
take my one little ewe-lamb from me.” 

Here I had another story to tell. After many interruptions 
in the way of questions from my listener, I ended it with the 
words — 

“And — will you believe me? — I saw the sword hanging in 
that armory this afternoon, close by that splendid hilt I pointed 
out to you.” 

“ How could you tell it among so many?’^ 

“Just as you could tell that white creature from this brown 
one. I know it, hilt and scabbard, as well as a human face.” 

“ As well as mine, for instance ?” 

“ I am surer of it than I was of you this morning. It hasn’t 
changed like you.” 

Our talk was interrupted by the appearance of a gentleman 
on horseback approaching us. I thought at first it was Clara’s 
father, setting out for home, and coming to bid us good-bye ; 
but I soon saw I was mistaken. Not, however, until he came 
quite close, did I recognize GeoflTrey Brotherton. He took oflf 
his hat to my companion, and reined in his horse. 

“ Are you going to give us in charge for trespassing, Mr. 
Brotherton?” said Clara. 

“I should be happy to take you in charge on any pretense. 
Miss Coningham. This is indeed an unexpected pleasure.” 

Here he looked in my direction. 

“ Ah !” he said, lifting his eyebrows, “ I thought I knew the 
old horse ! What a nice cob you’ve got. Miss Coningham !” 

He had not chosen to recognize me, of which I was glad, for 
I hardly knew how to order my behaviour to him. I had for- 


A BIDING LESSON. 


221 


gotten nothing. But, ill as I liked him, I was forced to confess 
that he had greatly improved in appearance — and manners too, 
notwithstanding his behaviour was as supercilious as ever to me. 

“ Do you call her a cob, then ?” said Clara. “ I should never 
have thought of calling her a cob. — She belongs to Mr. Cum- 
bermede.” 

“ Ah !” he said again, arching his eyebrows as before, and 
looking straight at me as if he had never seen me in his life. 

I think I succeeded in looking almost unaware of his pre- 
sence. At least so I tried to look, feeling quite thankful to 
Clara for defending my mare : to hear her called a cob was 
hateful to me. After listening to a few more of his remarks 
upon her, made without the slightest reference to her owner, 
who was not three yards from her side, Clara asked him, in the 
easiest manner — 

“Shall you be at the county ball?” 

“When is that?” 

“Next Thursday.” 

“ Are you going ?” 

“ I hope so.” 

“Then will you dance the first waltz with me?” 

“No, Mr. Brotherton.” 

“ Then I am sorry to say I shall be in London.” 

“When do you rejoin your regiment?” 

“ Oh ! I’ve got a month’s leave.” 

“Then why won’t you be at the ball?” 

“Because you won’t promise me the first waltz.” 

“ W ell — rather than the belles of Minstercombe should — 
ring their sweet changes in vain, I suppose I must indulge you.” 

“A thousand thanks,” he said, lifted his hat, and rode on. 

My blood was in a cold boil — if the phrase can convey an 
idea. Clara rode on homewards without looking round, and I 
followed, keeping a few yards behind her, hardly thinking at 
all, my very brain seeming cold inside my skull. 

There was small occasion as yet, some of my readers may 
think. I cannot help it — so it was. When we had gone in 
silence a couple of hundred yards or so, she glanced round at 


222 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


me with a quick, sly half look, and burst out laughing. I was 
by her side in an instant; her laugh had dissolved the spell 
that bound me. But she spoke first. 

“Well, Mr. Cumbermede ?” she said, with a slow interroga- 
tion. 

“Well, Miss Coningham?” I rejoined, but bitterly, I suppose. 

“ What’s the matter ?” she retorted sharply, looking up at 
me, full in the face, whether in real or feigned anger I could 
not tell. 

“ How could you talk of that fellow as you did, and then 
talk so to him?’’ 

“What right have you to put such questions to me? I am 
not aware of any intimacy to justify it.” 

“Then I beg your pardon. But my surprise remains the 
same.” 

“ Why, you silly boy !” she returned, laughing aloud, “ don’t 
you know he is, or will be, my feudal lord ? I am bound to be 
polite to him. What would become of poor grandpapa if I 
were to give him offence? Besides, I have been in the house 
with him for a week. He’s not a Crichton; but he dances 
well. Are you going to the ball ?” 

“ I never heard of it. I have not for weeks thought of any- 
thing but — ^but — my writing, till this morning. Now I fear 
I shall find it diJficult to return to it. It looks ages since I 
saddled the mare !” 

“ But if you’re ever to be an author, it won’t do to shut 
yourself up. You ought to see as much of the world as you 
can. I should strongly advise you to go to the ball.” 

“ I would willingly obey you — ^but — but — I don’t know how 
to get a ticket.” 

“ Oh I if you would like to go, papa will have much plea- 
sure in managing that. I will ask him.” 

“ I’m much obliged to you,” I returned. “ I should enjoy 
seeing Mr. Brotherton dance.” 

She laughed again, but it was an oddly constrained laugh. 

“ It’s quite time I were at home,” she said, and gave the mare 
the rein, increasing her speed as we approached the house. 


A RIDING LESSON. 


223 


Before I reached the little gate she had given her up to the 
gardener, who had been on the lookout for us. 

“ Put on her own saddle, and bring the mare round at once, 
please,’’ I called to the man, as he led her and the horse away 
together. 

“Won’t you come in, Wilfrid?” said Clara, kindly and 
seriously. 

“ No, thank you,” I returned ; for I was full of rage and 
jealousy. To do myself justice, however, mingled with these 
was pity that such a girl should be so easy with such a man. 
But I could not tell her what I knew of him. Even if I 
could have done so, I dared not; for the man who shows 
himself jealous must be readily believed capable of lying, or 
at least misrepresenting. 

“ Then I must bid you good evening,” she said, as quietly as 
if we had been together only five minutes. “ I am so much 
obliged to you for letting me ride your mare !” 

She gave me a half-friendly, half-stately little bow, and 
walked into the house. In a few moments the gardener re- 
turned with the mare, and I mounted and rode home in any- 
thing but a pleasant mood. Having stabled her, I roamed 
about the fields till it was dark, thinking for the first time in 
my life I preferred woods to open grass. When I went in at 
length I did my best to behave as if nothing had happened. 
My uncle must, however, have seen that something was amiss, 
but he took no notice, for he never forced or even led up to 
confidences. I retired early to bed, and passed an hour or two 
of wretchedness, thinking over every thiug that had happened — 
the one moment calling her a coquette, and the next ransack- 
ing a fresh comer of my brain to find fresh excuses for her. 
At length I was able to arrive at the conclusion that I did not 
understand her, and having given in so far, I soon fell asleep. 


224 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTEK XXVIL 

A DISAPPOINTMENT. 

I TRUST it will not be regarded as a sign of shallowness of 
nature that I rose in the morning comparatively calm. Clara 
was to me as yet only the type of general womanhood, around 
which the amorphous loves of my manhood had begun to 
gather — not the one woman whom the individual man in me 
had chosen and loved. How could I love that which I did 
not yet know : she was but the heroine of my objective life, 
as projected from me by my imagination — not the love of my 
being. Therefore, when the wings of sleep had fanned the 
motes from my brain, I was cool enough, notwithstanding an 
occasional tongue of indignant flame from the ashes of last 
night’s fire, to sit down to my books, and read with tolerable 
attention my morning portion of Plato. But when I turned 
to my novel, I found I was not master of the situation. My 
hero too was in love and in trouble ; and after I had written 
a sentence and a half, I found myself experiencing the fate of 
Heine when he roused the Sphinx of past love by reading his 
own old verses : 

Lebendig ward das Marmorbild, 

Der Stein begann zu achzen. 

In a few moments I was pacing up and down the room, 
eager to burn my moth-wings yet again in the old fire. And, 
by the way, I cannot help thinking that the moths enjoy their 
fate, and die in ecstasies. I was however too shy to venture 
on a call that very morning : I should both feel and look 
foolish. But there was no more work to be done then. I 
hurried to the stable, saddled my mare, and set out for a gal- 
lop across the farm, but towards the high road leading to 
Minstercorabe, in the opposite direction, that is, from the Hall, 
which I flattered myself was to act in a strong-minded man- 
ner. There were several hedges and fences between, but I 


A DISAPPOINTMENT. 


225 


cleared them all without discomfiture. The last jump was into 
a lane. We, that is my mare and I, had scarcely alighted, 
when my ears were invaded by a shout. The voice was the 
least welcome I could have heard, that of Brotherton. I turned 
and saw him riding up the hill, with a lady by his side. 

“ Hillo !” he cried, almost angrily, “ you don’t deserve to 
have such a cob.” (He would call her a cob.) “ You don’t 
know how to use her. To jump her on the hard like that !” 

It was Clara with him ! — on the steady stifi* old brown 
horse ! My first impulse was to jump my mare over the oppo- 
site fence, and take no heed of them, but clearly it was not to 
be attempted, for the ground fell considerably on the other 
side. My next thought was to ride away and leave them. 
My third was one which some of my readers will judge Quix- 
otic, but I have a profound reverence for the Don — and that 
not merely because I have so often acted as foolishly as he. 
This last I proceeded to carry out, and lifting my hat, rode to 
meet them. Taking no notice whatever of Brotherton, I 
addressed Clara — in what I fancied a distant and dignified 
manner, which she might, if she pleased, attribute to the 
presence of her companion. 

“ Miss Coningham,” I said, “ will you allow me the honor 
of offering you my mare ? She will carry you better.” 

“ You are very kind, Mr. Cumbermede,” she returned, in a 
similar tone, but with a sparkle in her eyes. “ I am greatly 
obliged to you. I cannot pretend to prefer old cross-bones to 
the beautiful creature which gave me so much pleasure 
yesterday.” 

I was off and by her side in a moment, helping her to dis- 
mount I did not even look at Brotherton, though I felt he 
was staring like an equestrian statue. While I shifted the 
saddles, Clara broke the silence which I was in too great an 
inward commotion to heed, by asking, 

“ What is the name of your beauty, Mr. Cumbermede ?” 

“ Lilith,” I answered. 

AVhat a pretty name! I never heard it before. Is it after 
any one — any public character, I mean? ’ 

15 


226 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Quite a public character/’ I returned — “Adam’s first wife.” 

“ I never heard he had two,” she rejoined, laughing. 

“ The Jews say he had. She is a demon now, and the pest 
of married women and their babies.” 

“ What a horrible name to give your mare !” 

“ The name is pretty enough. And what does it matter 
what the woman was, so long as she was beautiful.” 

“ I don’t quite agree with you there,” she returned, with 
what I chose to consider a forced laugh. 

By this time her saddle was firm on Lilith, and in an 
instant she was mounted. Brotherton moved to ride on, and 
the mare followed him. Clara looked back. 

“You will catch us up in a moment,” she said, possibly a 
little puzzled between us. 

I was busy tightening my girths, and fumbled over the job 
more than was necessary. Brotherton was several yards 
ahead, and she was walking the mare slowly after him. I 
made her no answer, but mounted, and rode in the opposite 
direction. It was rude, of course, but I did it. I could not 
have gone with them, and was afraid if I told her so she 
would dismount, and refuse the mare. 

In a tumult of feeling I rode on without looking behind me, 
careless whither — how long I cannot tell, before I woke up to 
find that I did not know where I was. I must ride on till I 
came to some place I knew, or met some one who could teU 
me. Lane led into lane, buried betwixt deep banks and lofty 
hedges, or passing through small woods, until I ascended a 
rising ground, whence I got a view of the country. At once 
its features began to dawn upon me : I was close to the village 
of Aldwick, where I had been at school, and in a few minutes 
I rode into its wide straggling street. Not a mark of change 
had passed upon it. There were the same dogs about the 
doors, and the same cats in the windows. The very ferns in 
the chinks of the old draw well appeared the same ; and the 
children had not grown an inch since first I drove into the 
place marvelling at its wondrous activity. 

The sun was hot, and my horse seemed rather tired. I was 


A DISAPPOINTMENT, 


227 


in no mood to see any one, and besides had no pleasant recol- 
lections of my last visit to Mr. Elder, so I drew up at the door 
of the little inn, and having sent my horse to the stable for an 
hour’s rest and a feed of oats, went into the sanded parlor, 
ordered a glass of ale, and sat staring at the china shep- 
herdesses on the chimney-piece. I see them now, the ugly 
things, as plainly as if that had been an hour of the happiest 
reflections. I thought I was miserable, but I know now that 
although I was much disappointed, and everything looked 
dreary and uninteresting about me, I was a long way off* 
misery. Indeed the passing vision of a neat unbonneted vil- 
lage-girl on her way to the well, was attractive enough still to 
make me rise and go to the window. While watching, as she 
wound up the long chain for the appearance of the familiar 
mossy bucket, dripping diamonds, as it gleamed out of the 
dark well into the sudden sunlight, I heard the sound of 
horses’ hoofs, and turned to see what kind of apparition 
would come. Presently it appeared, and made straight for 
the inn. The rider was Mr. Coningham I I drew back to 
escape his notice, but his quick eye had caught sight of me, 
for he came into the room with outstretched hand. 

“We are fated to meet, Mr. Cumbermede,” he said. “I 
only stopped to give my horse some meal and water, and had 
no intention of dismounting. Ale ? I’ll have a glass of ale, 
too,’’ he added, ringing the bell. “I think I’ll let him have a 
feed, and have a mouthful of bread and cheese myself” 

He went out, and had, I supposed, gone to see that his 
horse had his proper allowance of oats, for when he returned 
he said merrily : 

“ What have you done with my daughter, Mr. Cumber- 
mede ?” 

“ Why should you think me responsible for her, Mr. Con- 
ingham?” I asked, attempting a smile. 

No doubt he detected the attempt in the smile, for he 
looked at me with a sharpened expression of the eyes, as he 
answered — still in a merry tone : 

“ When I sav her la^t she was mounted on your horse, and 


228 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


you were on my father’s. I find you still on my father’s 
horse, and your own — with the lady — ^nowhere. Have I made 
out a case of suspicion ?” 

“ It is I who have cause of complaint,” I returned — “ who 
have neither lady nor mare — except indeed you imagine I 
have in the case of the latter made a good exchange.” 

“ Hardly that, I imagine, if yours is half so good as she 
looks. But, seriously, have you seen Clara to-day ?” 

I told him the facts as lightly as I could. When I had 
finished, he stared at me with an expression which for the 
moment I avoided attempting to interpret. 

“On horseback with Mr. Brotherton?” he said, uttering 
the words as if every syllable had been separately italicized. 

“ You will find it as I say,” I replied, feeling oflended. 

“ My dear boy — excuse my freedom,” he returned — “ I am 
nearly three times your age — you do not imagine I doubt a 
hair’s breadth of your statement ! But — ^the giddy goose ! — 
How could you be so silly ? Pardon me again. Your un- 
selfishness is positively amusing ! To hand over your horse to 
her, and then ride away all by yourself on that — respectable 
stager !” 

“ Don’t abuse the old horse,” I returned. “ He is respecta- 
ble, and has been more in his day.” 

“ Yes, yes. But for the life of me I cannot understand it. 
Mr. Cumbermede, I am sorry for you. I should not advise 
you to choose the law for a profession. The man who does 
not regard his own rights, will hardly do for an adviser in the 
affairs of others.” 

“ You were not going to consult me, Mr. Coningham, were 
you ?” I said, now able at length to laugh without effort. 

“ Not quite that,” he returned, also laughing. “ But a 
right, you know, is one of the most serious things in the 
world.” 

It seemed irrelevant to the trifling character of the case. I 
could not understand why he should regard the affair as of 
such importance. 

“ I have been in the way of thinking,” I said, “that one of 


A DISAPPOINTMENT. 


229 


the advantages of having rights was, that you could part with 
them when you pleased. You’re not bound to insist on your 
rights, are you ?” 

“Certainly you would not subject yourself to a criminal 
action by foregoing them, but you might suggest to your 
friends a commission of lunacy. I see how it is. That is 
your uncle all over ! He was never a man of the world.” 

“You are right there, Mr. Coningham. It is the last 
epithet any one would give my uncle.” 

“And the first any one would give me, you imply, Mr. 
Cumbermede.” 

“ I had no such intention,” I answered. “ That would have 
been rude.” 

“ Not in the least. I should have taken it as a compli- 
ment. The man who does not care about his rights, depend 
upon it, will be made a tool of by those that do. If he is not 
a spoon already, he will become one. I shouldn’t have iffed 
it at all if I hadn’t known you.” 

“ And you don’t want to be rude to me.” 

“ I don’t. A little experience will set you all right ; and 
that you are in a fair chance of getting if you push your 
fortune as a literary man. But I must be ofi*. I hope we 
may have another chat before long.” 

He finished his ale, rose, bade me good-bye, and went to the 
stable. As soon as he was out of sight, I also mounted and 
rode homewards. 

By the time I reached the gate of the park, my depression 
had nearly vanished. The comforting powers of sun and 
shadow, of sky and field, of wind and motion, had restored 
me to myself. With a side glance at the windows of the 
cottage as I passed, and the glimpse of a bright figure seated 
in the drawing-room window, I made for the stable, and found 
my Lilith waiting me. Once more I shifted my saddle, and 
rode home, without even another glance at the window as I 
passed. 

A day or two after, I received from Mr. Coningham a 
ticket for the county ball, accompanied by a kind note. I re- 


230 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


turned it at once, with the excuse that I feared incapacitating 
myself for work by dissipation. 

Henceforward I avoided the park, and did not again see 
Clara before leaving for London. I had a note from her, 
thanking me for Lilith, and reproaching me for having left 
her to the company of Mr. Brotherton, which I thought cool 
enough, seeing they had set out together without the slightest 
expectation of meeting me. I returned a civil answer, and 
there was an end of it. 

I must again say for myself, that it was not mere jealousy 
of Brotherton that led me to act as I did. I could not and 
would not get over the contradiction between the way in 
which she had spoken of him, and the way in which she spoke 
to him, followed by her accompanying him in the long ride to 
which the state of my mare bore witness. I concluded that, 
although she might mean no harm, she was not truthful. To 
talk of a man with such contempt, and then behave to him 
with such frankness, appeared to me altogether unjustifiable. 
At the same time their mutual familiarity pointed to some 
foregone intimacy, in which, had I been so inclined, I might 
have found some excuse for her, seeing she might have altered 
her opinion of him, and might yet find it very difficult to 
alter the tone of their intercourse. 


IN LONDON. 


231 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

IN LONDON. 

My real object being my personal history in relation to cer- 
tain facts and events, I must, in order to restrain myself from 
that discursiveness the impulse to which is an urging of the 
historical as well as the artistic Satan, even run the risk of 
appearing to have been blind to many things going on around 
me which must have claimed a large place had I been writing 
an autobiography instead of a distinct portion of one. 

I set out with my manuscript in my portmanteau, and a few 
pounds in my pocket, determined to cost my uncle as little as 
I could. 

I well remember the dreariness of London, as I entered it 
on the top of a coach, in the closing darkness of a late 
autumn afternoon. The shops were not all yet lighted, and a 
drizzly rain was falling. But these outer influences hardly 
got beyond my mental skin, for I had written to Charley, and 
hoped to find him waiting for me at the coach office. Nor 
was I disappointed, and in a moment all discomfort was for- 
gotten. He took me to his chambers in the New Inn. 

I found him looking better, and apparently, for him, in 
good spirits. It was soon arranged, at his entreaty, that for 
the present I should share his sitting-room, and have a bed 
put up for me in a closet he did not want. The next day I 
called upon certain publishers and left with them my manu- 
script. Its fate is of no consequence here, and I did not then 
wait to know it, but at once began to fly my feather at lower 
game, writing short papers and tales for the magazines. I 
had a little success from the first; and although the surround- 
ings of my new abode were dreary enough, although, now and 
then, especially when the winter sun shone bright into the 
court, I longed for one peep into space across the field that 


232 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


now itself lay far in the distance, I soon settled to my work, 
and found the life an enjoyable one. To work beside Charley 
the most of the day, and go with him in the evening to some 
place of amusement, or to visit some of the men in the 
chambers about us, was for the time a satisfactory mode of ex- 
istence. 

I soon told him the story of my little passage with Clara. 
During the narrative he looked uncomfortable and indeed 
troubled, but as soon as he found I had given up the affair, 
his countenance brightened. 

“ I’m very glad you’ve got over it so well,” he said. 

“ I think I’ve had a good deliverance,” I returned. 

He made no reply. Neither did his face reveal his 
thoughts, for I could not read the confused expression it bore. 

That he should not fall in with my judgment would never 
have surprised me, for he always hung back from condemna- 
tion, partly, I presume, from being even morbidly conscious 
of his own imperfections, and partly that his prolific sug- 
gestion supplied endless possibilities to explain or else perplex 
everything. I had been often even annoyed by his use of the 
most refined invention to excuse, as I thought, behaviour the 
most palpably wrong. I believe now it was rather to account 
for it than to excuse it. 

“ Well, Charley,” I would say in such case, “ I am sure you 
would never have done such a thing.” 

“ I cannot guarantee my own conduct for a moment,” he 
would answer — or, taking the other tack, would reply : ‘‘ Just 
for that reason I cannot believe the man would have done it.” 

But the oddity of the present case was that he said nothing. 
I should however have forgotten all about it, but that after 
some time I began to observe that as often as I alluded to 
Clara — which was not often — ^he contrived to turn the remark 
aside, and always without saying a syllable about her. The 
conclusion I came to was that, while he shrunk from con- 
demnation, he was at the same time unwilling to disturb the 
present serenity of my mind by defending her conduct. 

Early in the spring, an unpleasant event occurred of which 


IN LONDON. 


233 


I might have foreseen the possibility. One morning I was 
alone, working busily, when the door opened. 

“ Why, Charley — back already !’’ I exclaimed, going on to 
finish my sentence. 

Receiving no answer, I looked up from my paper, and 
started to my feet. Mr. Osborne stood before me, scrutinizing 
me with severe gray eyes. I think he knew me from the first, 
but I was sufiiciently altered to make it doubtful. 

“I beg your pardon,” he said coldly — “I thought these 
were Charles Osborne’s chambers,” and he turned to leave the 
room. 

“ They are his chambers, Mr. Osborne,” I replied, recover- 
ing myself with an effort, and looking him in the face. 

“ My son had not informed me that he shared them with 
another.” 

“We are very old friends, Mr. Osborne.” 

He made no answer, but stood regarding me fixedly. 

“You do not remember me, sir,” I said. “I am Wilfrid 
Cumbermede.” 

“ I have cause to remember you.” 

“ Will you not sit down, sir ? Charley will be home in 
less than an hour — I quite expect.” 

Again he turned his back as if about to leave me. 

“ If my presence is disagreeable to you,” I said, annoyed at 
his rudeness, “ I will go.” 

“ As you please,” he answered. 

I left my papers, caught up my hat, and went out of the 
room and the house. I said “ Good-morning,” but he made 
no return. 

Not until nearly eight o’clock did I re-enter. I had of 
course made up my mind that Charley and I must part. When 
I opened the door, I thought at first there was no one there ; 
there were no lights, and the fire had burned low. 

“ Is that you, Wilfrid ?” said Charley. 

He was lying on the sofa. 

“ Yes, Charley,” I returned. 

“Come in, old fellow. The avenger of blood is not behind 


234 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


me,” he said, in a mocking tone, as he rose and came to meet 
me. “I’ve been having such a dose of damnation— all for 
your sake !” 

“I’m very sorry, Charley. But I think we are both to 
blame. Your father ought to have been told. You see day 
after day went by, and — somehow — ” 

“ Tut, tut ! never mind. What does it matter — except that 
it’s a disgrace to be dependent on such a man ? I wish I had 
the courage to starve.” 

“ He’s your father, Charley. Nothing can alter that.” 

“ That’s the misery of it. And then to tell people God is 
their father. If he’s like mine, he’s done us a mighty favor 
in creating us! I can’t say I feel grateful for it. I must 
turn out to-morrow.” 

“ No, Charley. The place has no attraction for me without 
you, and it was yours first. Besides I can’t afibrd to pay so 
much. I will find another to-morrow. But we shall see each 
other often, and perhaps get through more work apart. I 
hope he didn’t insist on your never seeing me.” 

“ He did try it on ; but there I stuck fast, threatening to 
vanish, and scramble for my liviug as I best might. I told 
him you were a far better man than me, and did me nothing 
but good. But that only made the matter worse, proving 
your infiuence over me. Let’s drop it. It’s no use. Let’s go 
to the Olympic.” 

The next day, I looked for a lodging in Camden Town, 
attracted by the probable cheapness, and by the grass of the 
Regent’s Park ; and having found a decent place, took my 
things away while Charley was out. I had not got them, few 
as they were, in order in my new quarters before he made his 
appearance ; and as long as I was there few days passed on 
which we did not meet. 

One evening he walked in, accompanied by a fine-looking 
young fellow whom I thought I must know, and presently 
recognized as Home, our old schoolfellow, with whom I had 
fought in Switzerland. We had become good friends before 
we parted, and Charley and he had met repeatedly since. 


IN LONDON. 


235 


“ What are you doing now, Home ?” I asked him. 

** I have just taken deacon’s orders,” he answered. ** A 
friend of my father’s has promised me a living. I’ve been 
hanging about quite long enough now. A fellow ought to do 
something for his existence.” 

“ I can’t think how a strong fellow like you can take to 
mumbling prayers and reading sermons,” said Charley. 

“ It ain’t nice,” said Home, “ but it’s a very respectable pro- 
fession. There are viscounts in it, and lots of honorables.” 

“ I dare say,” returned Charley, with drought. “ But a 
nerveless creature like me, who can’t even hit straight from 
the shoulder, would be good enough for that. A giant like 
you, Home !” 

“ Ah ! by the bye, Osborne,” said Home, not in love with 
the prospect, and willing to turn the conversation, “ I thought 
you were a church-calf yourself.” 

“Honestly, Home, I don’t know whether it isn’t the 
biggest of all big humbugs.” 

“ Oh, but — Osborne ! — it ain’t the thing, you know, to talk 
like that of a profession adopted by so many great men fit to 
honor any profession,” returned Home, who was not one of 
the brightest of mortals, and was jealous of the profession 
just inasmuch as it was destined for his own. 

“ Either the profession honors the men, or the men dis- 
honor themselves,” said Charley. “ I believe it claims to have 
been founded by a man called Jesus Christ, if such a man 
ever existed except in the fancy of his priesthood.” 

“ Well, really,” expostulated Home, looking, I must say, 
considerably shocked, “ I shouldn’t have expected that from 
the son of a clergyman !” 

“I couldn’t help my father. I wasn’t consulted,” said 
Charley, with an uncomfortable grin. “ But, at any rate, my 
father fancies he believes all the story. I fancy I don’t.” 

“ Then you’re an infidel, Osborne.” 

“ Perhaps. Do you think that so very horrible ?” 

“Yes, I do. Tom Paine, and all the rest of them, you 
know !” 


236 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“Well, Home, I’ll tell you one thing I think worse 
than being an infidel.” 

“ What is that ?” 

“ Taking to the church for a living.” 

“ I don’t see that.” 

“ Either the so-called truths it advocates are things to live 
and die for, or they are the veriest old wives’ fables going. Do 
you know who was the first to do what you are about now ?” 

“ No. I can’t say. I’m not up in church history yet.” 

“ It was Judas.” 

I am not sure that Charley was right, but that is what he 
said. I was taking no part in the conversation, but listening 
eagerly, with a strong suspicion that Charley had been leading 
Home to this very point. 

“ A man must live,” said Home. 

“ That’s precisely what I take it Judas said : for my part, I 
don’t see it.” 

“ Don’t see what ?” 

“ That a man must live. It would be a far more incon- 
trovertible assertion that a man must die — and a more com- 
fortable one too.” 

“ Upon my word, I don’t understand you, Osborne! You 
make a fellow feel deuced queer with your remarks.” 

“ At all events, you will allow that the first of them — they 
call them apostles, don’t they? — didn’t take to preaching the 
gospel for the sake of a living. What a satire on the whole 
kit of them that word living^ so constantly in all their mouths, 
is ! It seems to me that Messrs. Peter and Paul and Matthew, 
and all the rest of them, forsook their livings for a good 
chance of something rather the contrary.” 

“ Then it was true — what they said about you at Forest’s ?” 

“ I don’t know what they said,” returned Charley ; “ but 
before I would pretend to believe what I didn’t ” 

“ But I do believe it, Osborne.” 

“ May I ask on what grounds ?” 

“ Why — everybody does.” 

“ That would be no reason, even if it were a fact, which it 


IN LONDON. 


237 


Is not. You believe it, or, rather, choose to think you believe 
it, because you’ve been told it. Sooner than pretend to teach 
what I had never learned, and be looked up to as a pattern 
of godliness, I would ’list in the ranks. There, at least, a 
man might earn an honest living.” 

“By Jove! You do make a fellow feel ’uncomfortable!” 
repeated Home : “ You’ve got such a — such an uncompromis- 
ing way of saying things -to use a mild expression!’’ 

“ I think it’s a sneaking thing to do, and unworthy of a 
gentleman.” 

“ I don’t see what right you’ve got to bully me in that way,” 
:3aid Home, getting angry. 

It was time to interfere. 

“ Charley is so afraid of being dishonest. Home,” I said, 
“ that he is rude. You are rude now, Charley.” 

“ I beg your pardon, Home,” exclaimed Charley at once. 

“Oh, never mind!” returned Home with gloomy good- 
nature. 

“ You ought to make allowance, Charley,” I pursued. 
“ When a man has been accustomed all his life to hear things 
spoken of in a certain way, he cannot help having certain 
notions to start with.” 

“ If I thought as Osborne does,” said Home, “ I would 
sooner ’list than go into the church.” 

“I confess,” I rejoined, “ I do not see how any one can take 
orders, except he not only loves God with all his heart, but 
receives the story of the New Testament as a revelation of 
Him, precious beyond utterance. To the man who accepts it 
so, the calling is the noblest in the world.” 

The others were silent, and the conversation turned away. 
From whatever cause. Home did not go into the church, but 
died fighting in India. 

He soon left us — Charley remaining behind. 

“ What a hypocrite I am !” he exclaimed ; — “ following a 
profession in which I must often, if I have any practice at all, 
defend what I know to be wrong, and seek to turn justice from 
its natural course.” 


238 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“But you can’t always know that your judgment is right, 
even if it should be against your client. I heard an eminent 
barrister say once, that he had come out of the court con- 
vinced by the arguments of the opposite counsel.” 

“ And having gained the case ?” 

“ That I don’t know.” 

“He went in believing his own side, any how, and that 
made it all right for him.” 

“I don’t know that, either. His private judgment was 
altered, but whether it was for or against his client, I do not 
remember. The fact however shows that one might do a great 
wrong by refusing a client whom he judged in the wrong.” 

“ On the contrary, to refuse a brief on such grounds would 
be best for all concerned. Not believing in it, you could not 
do your best, and might be preventing one who would believe 
in it from taking it up.” 

“ The man might not get anybody to take it up.” 

“ Then there would be little reason to expect that a jury 
charged under ordinary circumstances would give a verdict in 
his favor.” 

“ But it would be for the barristers to constitute themselves 
the judges.” 

“Yes — of their own conduct — only that. There I am 
again ! The finest ideas about the right thing, and going on 
all the same, with open eyes running my head straight into 
the noose ! Wilfrid, I‘m one of the weakest animals in crea- 
tion. What if you found at last that I had been deceiving 
youf What would you say?” 

“ Nothing, Charley — to any one else.” 

“ What would you say to yourself, then ?” 

“ I don’t know. I know what I should do.” 

“ What?” 

“Try to account for it, and find as many reasons as I could 
to justify you. That is, I would do just as you do for every 
one but yourself.” 

He was silent — plainly from emotion, which I attributed to 
his pleasure at the assurance of the strength of my friendship. 


IN LONDON. 


239 


“ Suppose you could find none T* he said, recovering him- 
self a little. 

“ I should still believe there were such. Tout comprendre 
c*est tout par donner, you know.” 

He brightened at this. 

“ You are a friend, Wilfrid ! What a strange condition 
mine is ! — forever feeling I could do this and that difficult 
thing, were it to fall in my way, and yet constantly failing in 
the simplest duties— even to that of common politeness. I 
behaved like a brute to Home. He’s a fine fellow, and only 
wants to see a thing to do it. I see it well enough, and don’t 
do it. Wilfrid, I shall come to a bad end. When it comes, 
mind I told you so, and blame nobody but myself. I mean 
what I say.” 

“Nonsense, Charley I It’s only that you haven’t active 
work enough, and get morbid with brooding over the germs 
of things.” 

“O Wilfrid, how beautiful a life might be! Just look at 
that one in the New Testament I Why shouldn’t I be like 
that ? I don’t know why. I feel as if I could. But I’m 
not, as you see — and never shall be. I’m selfish, and ill-tem- 
pered, and ” 

“ Charley 1 Charley I There never was a less selfish or 
better-tempered fellow in the world.” 

“ Don’t make me believe that, Wilfrid, or I shall hate the 
world as well as myself. It’s all my hypocrisy makes you 
think so. Because I am ashamed of what I am, and manage 
to hide it pretty well, you think me a saint. That is heaping 
damnation on me.” 

“Take a pipe, Charley, and shut up. That’s rubbish!” I 
said. I doubt much if it was what I ought to have said, but 
I was alarmed for the consequences of such brooding, “I 
wonder what the world would be like if every one considered 
himself acting up to his own idea !” 

“ If he was acting so, then it would do the world no harm 
that he knew it.” 

“ But his ideal must then be a low one, and that would do 


240 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


himself and everybody the worst kind of harm. The greatest 
men have always thought the least of themselves.’’ 

“Yes, but that was because they were the greatest. A man 
may think little of himself just for the reason that he is little, 
and can’t help knowing it.” 

“ Then it’s a mercy he does know it ! for most small people 
think much of themselves.” 

“ But to know it — and to feel all the time you ought to be 
and could be something very different, and yet never get a 
step nearer it I That is to be miserable. Still it is a mercy to 
Know it. There is always a last help.” 

I mistook what he meant, and thought it well to say no 
more. After smoking a pipe or two he was quieter, and left 
me with a merry remark. 

One lovely evening in spring, I looked from my bed-room 
window, and saw the red sunset burning in the thin branches 
of the solitary poplar that graced the few feet of garden 
behind the house. It drew me out to the park, where the 
trees were all in young leaf, each with its shadow stretching 
away from its foot, like its longing to reach its kind across 
dividing space. The grass was like my own grass at home, 
and I went wandering over it in all the joy of the new spring, 
which comes every year to our hearts as well as to their pic- 
ture outside. The workmen were at that time busy about the 
unfinished botanical gardens, and I wandered thitherward^ 
lingering about, and pondering and inventing, until the sun 
was long withdrawn, and the shades of night had grown very 
brown. I was at length sauntering slowly home to put a few 
finishing touches to a paper I had been at work upon all day, 
when something about a young couple in front of me attracted 
my attention. They were walking arm in arm, talking 
eagerly, but so low that I heard only a murmur. I did not 
quicken my pace, yet was gradually gaining upon them, when 
suddenly the conviction started up in my mind that the gentle- 
man was Charley. I could not mistake his back, or the stoop 
of his shoulders as he bent towards his companion. I was so 
certain of him that I turned at once from the road, and wan- 


IN LONDON. 


241 


dered away across the grass : if he did not choose to tell me 
about the lady, I had no right to know. But I confess to a 
strange trouble that he had left me out. I comforted myself 
however with the thought that perhaps when we next met he 
would explain, or at least break, the silence. 

After about an hour, he entered in an excited mood, merry 
but uncomfortable. I tried to behave as if I knew nothing, 
but could not help feeling much disappointed when he left me 
without a word of his having had a second reason for being 
in the neighborhood. 

What effect the occurrence might have had, whether the 
cobweb veil of which I was now aware between us would have 
thickened to opacity or not, I cannot tell. I dare not imagine 
that it might. I rather hope that by degrees my love would 
have got the victory, and melted it away. But now came a 
cloud which swallowed every other in my firmament. The next 
morning brought a letter from my aunt, telling me that my 
uncle had had a stroke, as she called it, and at that moment 
was lying insensible. I put my affairs in order at once, 
and Charley saw me away by the afternoon coach. 

It was a dreary journey. I loved my uncle with perfect 
confidence and profound veneration, a result of the faithful 
and open simplicity with which he had always behaved 
towards me. If he were taken away, and already he might 
be gone, I should be lonely indeed, for on whom besides could 
I depend with anything like the trust which I had reposed in 
him ? For, conceitedly or not, I had always felt that Charley 
rather depended on me — that I had rather to take care of 
him, than to look for counsel from him. 

The weary miles rolled away. Early in the morning we 
reached Minstercombe. There I got a carriage, and at once 
continued my journey. 


242 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

CHANGES. 

I MET no one at the house-door, or in the kitchen, and 
walked straight up the stair to my uncle’s room. The blinds 
were down, and the curtains were drawn, and I could but just 
see the figure of my aunt seated beside the bed. She rose, 
and without a word of greeting, made way for me to approach 
the form which lay upon it, stretched out straight and motion- 
less. The conviction that I was in the presence of death 
seized me ; but instead of the wretchedness of heart and soul 
which I had expected to follow the loss of my uncle, a some- 
thing deeper than any will of my own asserted itself, and as it 
were took the matter from me. It was as if my soul avoided 
the sorrow of separation by breaking with the world of mate- 
rial things, asserting the shadowy nature of all the visible, 
and choosing its part with the something which had passed 
away. It was as if my deeper self said to my outer conscious- 
ness : ** I too am of the dead — one with them, whether they 
live or are no more. For a little while I am shut out from 
them, and surrounded with things that seem : let me gaze on 
the picture while it lasts ; dream or no dream, let me live in 
it according to its laws, and await what will come next ; if an 
awaking, it is well ; if only a perfect because dreamless sleep, 
I shall not be able to lament the endless separation — but 
while I know myself, I will hope for something better.” Like 
liis at least was the blossom into which, under my after brood- 
ing, the bud of that feeling broke. 

I laid my hand upon my uncle’s forehead. It was icy cold, 
just like my grannie’s when my aunt had made me touch it. 
And I knew that my uncle was gone, that the slow tide of the 
eternal ocean had risen while he lay motionless within the 
wash of its waves, and had floated him away from the 


CHANGES. 


243 


shore of our world. I took the hand of my aunt, who stood 
like a statue behind me, and led her from the room. 

“ He is gone, aunt,” I said, as calmly as I could. 

She made no reply, but gently withdrew her hand from mine, 
and returned into the chamber. I stood a few moments 
irresolute, but reverence for her sorrow prevailed, and I went 
iown the stair, and seated myself by the fire. There the ser- 
vant told me that my uncle had never moved since they laid 
him in his bed. Soon after, the doctor arrived, and went up 
stairs ; but returned in a few minutes, only to affirm the fact. 
I went again to the room, and found my aunt lying with her 
face on the bosom of the dead man. She allowed me to draw 
her away, but when I would have led her down, she turned 
aside, and sought her own chamber, where she remained for 
the rest of the day. 

I will not linger over that miserable time. Greatly as I 
revered my uncle, I was not prepared to find how much he 
had been respected, and was astonished at the number of 
faces I had never seen which followed to the church-yard. 
Amongst them were the Coninghams, father and son; but 
except by a friendly grasp of the hand, and a few words of 
condolence, neither interrupted the calm depression rather 
than grief in which I found myself. When I returned home, 
there was with my aunt a married sister, whom I had never 
seen before. Up to this time, she had shown an arid despair, 
and been regardless of everything about her ; but now she was 
in tears. I left them together, and wandered for hours up and 
down the lonely playground of my childhood, thinking of 
many things — most of all, how strange it was that, if there 
were a hereafter for us, we should know positively nothing 
concerning it ; that not a whisper should cross the invisible 
line ; that the something which had looked from its windows so 
lovingly, should have in a moment withdrawn, by some back 
way unknown either to itself or us, into a region of which all 
we can tell is that thence no prayers and no tears will entice 
it, to lift for an instant again the fallen curtain, and look out 
once more. Why should not God, I thought, if a God there 


244 


WILFKID CUMBEEMEDE. 


be, permit one single return to each, that so the friends left 
behind in the dark might be sure that death was not the end, 
and so live in the world as not of the world ? 

When I re-entered, I found my aunt looking a little cheer- 
ful. She was even having something to eat with her sister — 
an elderly country-looking woman, the wife of a farmer in a 
distant shire. Their talk had led them back to old times, to 
their parents and the friends of their childhood; and the 
memory of the long dead had comforted her a little over the 
recent loss; for all true hearts death is a uniting, not a 
dividing power. 

“ I suppose you will be going back to London, Wilfrid ?” 
said my aunt, who had already been persuaded to pay her 
sister a visit. 

‘‘I think I had better,” I answered. “When I have a 
chance of publishing a book, I should like to come and write 
it, or at least finish it here, if you will let me.” 

“The place is your own, Wilfrid. Of course I shall be 
very glad to have you here.” 

“ The place is yours as much as mine, aunt,” I replied. “ I 
canT bear to think that my uncle has no right over it still. 
I believe he has, and therefore it is yours just the same — ^not 
to mention my own wishes in the matter.” 

She made no reply, and I saw that both she and her sister 
were shocked either at my mentioning the dead man, or at my 
supposing he had any earthly rights left. The next day they 
set out together, leaving in the house the wife of the head man 
at the farm to attend to me until I should return to town. I 
had purposed to set out the following morning, but I found 
myself enjoying so much the undisturbed possession of the 
place, that I remained there for ten days ; and when I went, 
it was with the intention of making it my home as soon as I 
might ; I had grown enamored of the solitude so congenial to 
labor. Before I left I arranged my uncle’s papers, and in doing 
so found several early sketches, which satisfied me that he 
might have distinguished himself in literature if his fate had 
led him thitherward. 


CHANGES. 


245 


Having given the house in charge to my aunt’s deputy, Mrs, 
Herbert, I at length returned to my lodging in Camden Town. 
There I found two letters waiting me, the one announcing the 
serious illness of my aunt, the other her death. The latter was 
two days old. I wrote to express my sorrow, and excuse my 
apparent neglect, and having made a long journey to see her 
also laid in the earth, I returned to my old home in order to 
make fresh arrangements. 


246 


WILFRID CUMBEKMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXX. 

PROPOSALS. 

Mrs. Herbert attended me during the forenoon, but left 
me after my early dinner. I made my tea for myself, and a 
tankard filled from a barrel of ale of my uncle’s brewing, 
with a piece of bread and cheese, was my unvarying supper. 
The first night I felt very lonely, almost indeed what the 
Scotch call eerie. The place, although inseparably interwoven 
with my earliest recollections, drew back and stood apart from 
me — ^a thing to be thought about ; and, in the ancient house, 
amidst the lonely field, I felt like a ghost condemned to return 
and live the vanished time over again. I had had a fire 
lighted in my own room ; for, although the air was warm out- 
side, the thick stone walls seemed to retain the chilly breath 
of last winter. The silent rooms that filled the house forced 
the sense of their presence upon me. I seemed to see the 
forsaken things in them staring at each other, hopeless and 
useless, across the dividing space, as if saying to themselves, 
“We belong to the dead, are mouldering to the dust after 
them, and in the dust alone we meet.” From the vacant 
rooms my soul seemed to float out beyond, searching still — ^to 
find nothing but loneliness and emptiness betwixt me and the 
stars ; and beyond the stars more loneliness and more empti- 
ness still — no rest for the sole of the foot of the wandering 
Psyche — save — one mighty saving— an exception which if 
true must be the one all-absorbing rule. “ But,” I was saying 
to m3; self, “ love unknown is not even equal to love lost,” when 
my revery was broken by the dull noise of a horse’s hoofs 
upon the sward. I rose and went to the window. As I crossed 
the room, my brain rather than myself suddenly recalled the 
night when my pendulum drew from the churning trees the 
unwelcome genius of the storm. The moment I reached the 


PROPOSALS. 247 

window — there through the dim summer twilight, once more 
from the trees, now as still as sleep, came the same figure. 

Mr. Coningham saw me at the fire-lighted window, and 
halted. 

“ May I be admitted ? ” he asked, ceremoniously. 

I made a sign to him to ride round to the door, for I could not 
speak aloud : it would have been rude to the memories that 
haunted the silent house. 

“ May I come in for a few minutes, Mr. Cumbermede ?” he 
asked again, already at the door by the time I had opened it. 

“ By aU means, Mr. Coningham,” I replied. “Only you must 
tie your horse to this ring for we — I — have no stable here.” 

“ I’ve done this before,” he answered, as he made the animal 
fast. “I know the ways of the place well enough. But 
surely you’re not here in absolute solitude.” 

“ Yes, I am. I prefer being alone at present.” 

“Very unhealthy, I must say! You will grow hypochon- 
driacal if you mope in this fashion,” he returned, following 
me up the stairs to my room. 

“ A day or two of solitude now and then would, I suspect, 
do most people more good than harm,” I answered. “ But 
you must not think I intend leading a hermit’s life. Have 
you heard that my aunt ?” 

“ Yes, yes.— You are left alone in the world. But relations 
are not a man’s only friends — and certainly not always his 
best friends.” 

I made no reply, thinking of my uncle. 

“ I did not know you were down,” he resumed. “ I was 
calling at my father’s and seeing your light across the park, 
thought it possible you might be here, and rode over to see. — 
May I take the liberty of asking what your plans are?” he 
added, seating himself by the fire. 

“ I have hardly had time to form new ones ; but I mean to 
stick to my work, anyhow.” 

“ You mean your profession ?’’ 

“ Yes, if you will allow me to call it such. I have had suc- 
cess enough already to justify me in going on. 


248 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I am more pleased than surprised to hear it,” he answered. 
“ But what will you do with the old nest ?” 

“Let the old nest wait for the old bird, Mr. Coningham — 
keep it to die in.” 

“ I don’t like to hear a young fellow talking that way,” he 
remonstrated. “You’ve got a long life to live yet — at least I 
hope so. But if you leave the house untenanted till the period 
to which you allude, it will be quite unfit by that time even 
for the small service you propose to require of it. Why not 
let it — for a term of years? I could find you a tenant, I make 
no doubt.” 

“ I won’t let it. I shall meet the world all the better if I 
have a place of my own to take refuge in.” 

“ Well, I can’t say but there’s good in that fancy. To have 
any spot of your own, however small— freehold, I mean— must 
be a comfort. At the same time, what’s the world for, if you’re 
to meet it in that half-hearted way ? I don’t mean that every 
young man — there are exceptions — must sow just so many 
bushels of avenafatua. There are plenty of enjoyments to be 
got without leading a wild life — which I should be the last to 
recommend to any young man of principle. Take my advice 
and let the place. But pray don’t do me the injustice to 
fancy I came to look after a job. I shall be most happy to 
serve you.” 

“ I am exceedingly obliged to you,” I answered. “ If you 
could let the farm for me for the rest of the lease, of which 
there are but a few years to run, that would be of great conse- 
quence to me. Herbert, my uncle’s foreman, who has the 
management now, is a very good fellow, but I doubt if he will 
do more than make both ends meet without my aunt, and the 
account^ would bother me endlessly.” 

“ I shall find out whether Lord Inglewold be inclined to re- 
sume the fag-end. In such case, as the lease has been a long 
one, and land has risen much, he would doubtless pay a part 
pf the difierence. Then there’s the stock — worth a good deal, 
I should think. I’ll see what can be done. And then there’s 
the stray bit* of park?” 


PROPOSALS. 


249 


“What do you mean by that?” I asked. “We have been 
in the way of calling it the parky though why, I never could 
tell. I confess it does look like a bit of Sir Giles’s that had 
wandered beyond the gates.” 

“There is some old story or other about it, I believe. The 
possessors of the Moldwarp estate have, from time immemorial, 
regarded it as properly theirs. I know that.” 

“I am much obliged to them, certainly, /have been in the 
habit of thinking differently.” 

“ Of course, of course,” he rejoined, laughing. “ But there 
may have been some — mistake somewhere. I know Sir Giles 
would give five times its value for it.” 

“He should not have it if he offered the Moldwarp estate 
in exchange,” I cried indignantly; and the thought flashed 
across me that this temptation was what my uncle had feared 
from the acquaintance of Mr. Coningham. 

“Your sincerity will not be put to so great a test as that,” 
he returned, laughing quite merrily. “ But I am glad you have 
such a respect for real property. At the same time — ^how many 
acres are there of it?” 

“ I don’t know,” I answered curtly and truly. 

“It’s of no consequence. Only if you don’t want to be 
tempted, don’t let Sir Giles or my father broach the subject. 
You needn’t look at me. I am not Sir Giles’s agent. Neither 
do my father and I run in double harness. He hinted, how- 
ever, this very day, that he believed the old fool wouldn’t stick 
at £500 an acre for this bit of grass — if he couldn’t get it for 
less.” 

“ If that is what you have come about, Mr. Coningham,” I 
rejoined, haughtily I dare say, for something I could not well 
define made me feel as if the dignity of a thousand ancestors 
were periled in my own, “ I beg you will not say another word 
on the subject, for sell this land I will not” 

He was looking at me strangely : his eye glittered with what, 
under other circumstances, I might have taken for satisfaction ; 
but he turned his face away and rose, saying, with a curiously 
altered tone, as he took up his hat; 


250 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“I’m very sorry to have offended you, Mr. Cumbermede. I 
sincerely beg your pardon. I thought our old — friendship may 
I not call it? — would have justified me in merely reporting 
what I had heard. I see now that I was wrong. I ought to 
have shown more regard for your feelings at this trying time. 
But again I assure you I was only reporting, and had not the 
slightest intention of making myself a go-between in the mat- 
ter. One word more : I have no doubt I could Ut the field for 
you — at good grazing rental. That I think you could hardly 
object to.” 

“ I should be much obliged to you,” I replied — “ for a term 
of not more than seven years — but without the house, and with 
the stipulation expressly made that I have right of way in every 
direction through it.” 

“Reasonable enough,” he answered. 

“ One thing more,” I said, “ all these affairs must be pure 
matters of business between us.” 

“As you please,” he returned, with, I fancied, a shadow of 
disappointment if not of displeasure on his countenance. “I 
should have been more gratified if you had accepted a friendly 
office; but I will do my best for you, notwithstanding.” 

“ I had no intention of being unfriendly, Mr. Coningham,” 
I said. “But when I think of it, I fear I may have been rude, 
for the bare proposal of selling this Naboth’s vineyard of mine 
would go far to make me rude to any man alive. It sounds 
like an invitation to dishonor myself in the eyes of my ancestors.” 

“Ah! you do care about your ancestors?” he said, half mu- 
singly, and looking into his hat. 

“ Of course I do ! Who is there does not ?” 

“Only some ninety-nine hundredth of the English nation.” 

“ I cannot well forget,” I returned, “ what my ancestors have 
done for me.” 

“ Whereas most people only remember that their ancestors 
can do no more for them. I declare I am almost glad I 
offended you. It does one good to hear a young man speak 
like that in these degenerate days, when a buck would rather 
be the son of a rich brewer than a decayed gentleman. I will 


PROPOSALS. 251 

call again about the end of the week — that is if you will be 
here — and report progress.” 

His manner, as he took his leave, was at once more friendly 
and more respectful than it had yet been — a change which I 
attributed to his having discovered in me more firmness than 
he had expected, in regard, if not of my rights, at least of my 
social position. 


252 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXXL 

ARRANGEMENTS. 

My custom at this time, and for long after I had finally 
settled down in the country, was to rise early in the morning — 
often, as I used when a child, before sunrise, in order to see the 
first burst of the sun upon the new-born world. I believed 
then, as I believe still, that, lovely as the sunset is, the sunrise 
is more full of mystery, poetry, and even, I had almost said, 
pathos. But often ere he was well up I had begun to imagine 
what the evening would be like, and with what softly mingled, 
all but imperceptible gradations it would steal into night. 
Then when the night came, I would wander about my little 
field, vainly endeavoring to picture the glory with which the 
next day’s sun would rise upon me. Hence the morning and 
evening became well known to me; and yet I shrink from say- 
ing it, for each is endless in the variety of its change. And the 
longer I was alone, I became the more enamored of solitude, 
with the labor to which, in my case, it was so helpful ; and be- 
gan indeed to be in some danger of losing sight of my relation 
to “ a world of men,” for with that world my imagination and 
my love for Charley were now my sole recognizable links. 

In the fore-part of the day, I read and wrote ; and in the 
after-part found both employment and pleasure in arranging 
my uncle’s books, amongst which I came upon a good many 
treasures whereof I was now able in some measure to appreci- 
ate the value — thinking often, amidst their ancient dust and 
odors, with something like indignant pity, of the splendid col- 
lection, as I was sure it must be, mouldering away in utter 
neglect at the neighboring Hall. 

I was on my knees in the midst of a pile which I had drawn 
from a cupboard under the shelves, when Mrs. Herbert showed 
Mr. Coningham in. I was annoyed, for my uncle’s room was 


ARRANGEMENTS. 


253 


sacred; but as I was about to take him to my own, I saw such 
a look of interest upon his face that it turned me aside, and I 
asked him to take a seat. 

“ If you do not mind the dust,” I added. 

“ Mind the dust I” he exclaimed,— “ of old books ! I count 
it almost sacred. I am glad you know how to value them.” 

What right had he to be glad ? How did he know I valued 
them? How could I but value them? I rebuked my offence, 
however, and after a little talk about them, in which he revealed 
much more knowledge than I should have expected, it vanished. 
He then informed me of an arrangement he and Liord Ingle- 
wold’s factor had been talking over in respect of the farm ; 
also of an offer he had had for my field. I considered both 
sufficiently advantageous in my circumstances, and the result 
was that I closed with both. 

A few days after this arrangement I returned to Loudon, 
intending to remain for some time. I had a warm welcome 
from Charley, but could not help fancying an unacknowledged 
something dividing us. He appeared, notwithstanding, less 
oppressed, and, in a word, more like other people. I proceeded 
at once to finish two or three papers and stories, which late 
events had interrupted. But within a week London had 
grown to me stifling and unendurable, and I longed unspeak- 
ably for the free air of my field, and the loneliness of my small 
castle. If my reader regard me as already a hypochondriac, 
the sole disproof I have to offer is, that I was then diligently 
writing what some years afterwards obtained a hearty reception 
from the better class of the reading public. Whether my 
habits were healthy or not, whether my love of solitude was 
natural or not, I cannot but hope from this that my modes of 
thinking were. The end was, that, after finishing the work I 
had on hand, I collected my few belongings, gave up my lodg- 
ing, bade Charley good-bye, receiving from him a promise to 
visit me at my own house if possible, and took my farewell of 
London for a season, determined not to return until I had pro- 
duced a work which my now more enlarged judgment might 
consider fit to see the light. I had laid out all my spare money 


254 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


upon books, with which in a few heavy trunks I now went back 
to my solitary dwelling. I had no care upon my mind, for my 
small fortune along with the rent of my field was more than 
sufficient for my maintenance in the almost anchoretic seclu- 
sion in which I intended to live, and hence I had every advan- 
tage for the more definite projection and prosecution of a work 
which had been gradually shaping itself in my mind for months 
past. 

Before leaving for London I had already spoken to a handy 
lad employed upon the farm, and he had kept himself free to 
enter my service when I should require him. He was the 
more necessary to me that I still had my mare Lilith, from 
which nothing but fate should ever part me. I had no diffi- 
culty in arranging with the new tenant for her continued ac- 
commodation at the farm ; while, as Herbert still managed its 
affairs, the services of his wife were available as often as I 
required them. But my man soon made himself capable of 
doing everything for me, and proved himself perfectly trust- 
worthy. 

I must find a name for my place — ^for its own I will not 
write: let me call it The Moat; there were signs, plain enough 
to me after my return from Oxford, that there had once been 
a moat about it, of which the hollow I have mentioned as the 
spot where I used to lie and watch for the sun’s first rays had 
evidently been a part. But the remains of the moat lay at a 
considerable distance from the house, suggesting a large area 
of building at some former period, proof of which, however, 
had entirely vanished, the house bearing every sign of a nar- 
row completeness. 

The work I had undertaken required a constantly recurring 
reference to books of the sixteenth century ; and although I 
had provided as many as I thought I should need, I soon 
found them insufficient. My uncle’s library was very large 
for a man in his position, but it was not by any means equally 
developed ; and my necessities made me think often of the old 
library at the Hall, which might contain somewhere in its ruins 
every book I wanted. Not only, however, would it have been 


ARRANGEMENTS. 


255 


useless to go searching in the formless mass for this or that 
volume, but, unable to grant Sir Giles the desire of his heart 
in respect of my poor field, I did not care to ask of him the 
comparatively small favor of being allowed to burrow in his 
dust-heap of literature. 

I was sitting, one hot noon, almost in despair over a certain 
little point concerning which I could find no definite informa- 
tion, when Mr. Coningham called. After some business mat- 
ters had been discussed, I mentioned, merely for the sake of 
talk, the difficulty I was in — the sole disadvantage of a resi- 
dence in the country as compared with London, where the 
British Museum was the unfading resort of all who required 
such aid as I was in want of. 

“ But there is the library at Moldwarp Hall,” he said. 

“Yes, there it is ; but there is not here” 

“ I have no doubt Sir Giles would make you welcome to 
borrow what books you wanted. He is a good-natured man. 
Sir GUes.” 

I explained my reason for not troubling him. 

“ Besides,” I added, “ the library is in such absolute chaos, 
that I might with less loss of time run up to London, and find 
any volume I happened to want among the old-book shops. 
You have no idea what a mess Sir Giles’s books are in — 
scarcely two volumes of the same book to be found even in 
proximity. It is one of the most painful sights I ever saw.” 

He said little more, but from what followed, I suspect either 
he or his father spoke to Sir Giles on the subject ; for, one 
day, as I was walking past the park-gates, which I had sel- 
dom entered since my return, I saw him just within, talking 
to old Mr. Coningham. I saluted him in passing, and he not 
only returned the salutation in a friendly manner, but made a 
step towards me as if he wished to speak to me. I turned and 
approached him. He came out and shook hands with me. 

“I know who you are, Mr. Cumbermede, although I have never 
had the pleasure of speaking to you before,” he said frankly. 

“ There you are mistaken. Sir Giles,” I returned ; “ but you 
could hardly be expected to remember the little boy who, 


256 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


many years ago, having stolen one of your apples, came to you 
to comfort him.” He laughed heartily. 

“ I remember the circumstances well,” he said. “ And you 
were that unhappy culprit ? Ha ! ha ! ha ! To tell the truth, 
I have thought of it many times. It was a remarkably fine 
thing to do.” 

“ What! steal the apple. Sir Giles?” 

“ Make the instant reparation you did.” 

“ There was no reparation in asking you to box my ears.” 

“ It was all you could do, though.” 

“ To ease my own conscience, it was. There is always a 
satisfaction, I suppose, in sufi*ering for our sins. But I have 
thought a thousand times of your kindness in shaking hands 
with me instead. You treated me as the angels treat the re- 
pentant sinner. Sir Giles.” 

“ Well, I certainly never thought of it in that light,” he 
said; then, as if wishing to change the subject, — “ Don’t you 
find it lonely now your uncle is gone ?” he asked. 

“ I miss him more than I can tell.” 

A very worthy man he was — too good for this world by 
all accounts.” 

‘‘ He’s not the worse off for that now. Sir Giles, I trust.” 

“ No ; of course not,” he returned quickly, with the usual 
shrinking from the slightest allusion to what is called the other 
world. — “ Is there anything I can do for you ? You are a 
literary man they tell me. There are a good many books of 
one sort and another lying at the Hall. Some of them might 
be of use to you. They are at your service. I am sure you 
are to be trusted even with mouldy books, which, from what 
I hear, must be a greater temptation to you now than red- 
cheeked apples,” he added, with another merry laugh. 

“ I will tell you what. Sir Giles,” I answered. “ It has 
often grieved me to think of the state of your library. It would 
be scarcely possible for me to find a book in it now. But if 
you would trust me, I should be delighted, in my spare hours, 
of which I can command a good many, to put the whole in 
order for you.” 


AKRANGEMENTS. 


257 


“ I should be under the greatest obligation. I have always 
intended having some capable man down from London to ar- 
range it. I am no great reader myself, but I have the highest 
respect for a good library. It ought never to have got into 
the condition in which I found it.’' 

“ The books are fast going to ruin, I fear.” 

“ Are they indeed ?” he exclaimed, with some consternation. 

I was not in the least aware of that. I thought so long as I 
let no one meddle with them, they were safe enough.” 

“ The law of the moth and rust holds with books as well as 
other unused things,” I answered. 

“ Then, pray, my dear sir, undertake the thing at once,” he 
said, in a tone to which the uneasioess of self-reproach gave a 
touch of imperiousness. “ But really,” he added, “ it seems 
trespassing on your goodness much too far. Your time is 
valuable. Would it be a long job ?” 

“ It would doubtless take some months ; but the pleasure of 
seeing order drawn from confusion would itself repay me. 
And I might come upon certain books of which I am greatly 
in want. You will have to allow me a carpenter though, for 
the shelves are not half sufficient to hold the books ; and I 
have no doubt those there are stand in need of repair.” 

“ I have a carpenter amongst my people. Old houses want 
constant attention. I shall put him under your orders with 
pleasure. Come and dine with me to-morrow, and we’ll talk 
it all over.” 

“You are very kind,” I said. “Is Mr. Brotherton at 
home?” 

“ I am sorry to say he is not.” 

“ I heard the other day that he had sold his commission.” 

“ Yes — six months ago. His regiment was ordered to India, 

and — and — his mother. But he does not give us much of 

his company,” added the old man. “I am sorry he is not at 
home, for he would have been glad to meet you.” 

Instead of responding, I merely made haste to accept Sir 
Giles’s invitation. I confess I did not altogether relish having 
anything to do w ith the future property of Geoffrey Broth- 
17 


258 


WILFRID CUMBELMEDE. 


erton ; but the attraction of the books was great, and in any 
case I should be under no obligation to him ; neither was the 
nature of the service I was about to render him such as would 
awaken any sense of obligation in a mind like his. 

I could not help recalling the sarcastic criticisms of Clara 
when I entered the drawing-room of Moldwarp Hall — a long, 
low-ceiled room, with its walls and stools and chairs covered 
with tapestry, some of it the work of the needle, other some 
of the Gobelin loom ; but although I found Lady Brotherton 
a common enough old lady, who showed little of the dignity 
of which she evidently thought much, and was more conde- 
scending to her yeoman neighbor than was agreeable, I did not 
at once discover ground for the severity of those remarks. 
Miss Brotherton, the eldest of the family, a long-necked lady, 
the flower of whose youth was beginning to curl at the edges, I 
found well-read, but whether in books or the reviews of them, 

I had to leave an open question as yet. Nor was I suffi- 
ciently taken with her not to feel considerably dismayed when 
she proffered me her assistance in arranging the library. I 
made no objection at the time, only hinting that the drawing 
up of a catalogue afterwards might be a fitter employment for 
her fair fingers ; but I resolved to create such a fearful pother 
at the very beginning, that her first visit should be her last. 
And so I doubt not it would have fallen out, but for some- 
thing else. The only other person who dined with us was a 
Miss Pease— at least so I will call her — who, although the 
law of her existence appeared to be fetching and carrying for 
Lady Brotherton, was yet, in virtue of a poor relationship, 
allowed an uneasy seat at the table. Her obedience was me- 
chanically perfect. One wondered how the mere nerves of 
volition could act so instantaneously upon the slightest hint. 
I saw her more than once or twice withdraw her fork when 
almost at her lips, and almost before she had laid it down, rise 
from her seat to obey some half-whispered, half-nodded behest. 
But her look was one of injured meekness and self-humbled 
submission. Sir Giles now and then gave her a kind or 
merry word, but she would reply to it with almost abject hu- 


ARRANGEMENTS. 


259 


mility. Her face was gray and pinched, her eyes were very 
cold, and she ate as if she did not know one thing from 
another. 

Over our wine Sir Giles introduced business. I professed 
myself ready, with a house-maid and carpenter at my orders 
when I should want them, to commence operations the 
following afternoon. He begged me to ask for whatever I 
might want, and after a little friendly chat I took my leave, 
elated with the prospect of the work before me. About three 
o’clock the next afternoon I took my way to the Hall, to 
assume the temporary office of creative librariam 


260 


WILFEID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXXII 

PREPARATIONS. 

It was a lovely afternoon, the air hot, and the shadows of 
the trees dark upon the green grass. The clear sun was 
shining sideways on the little oriel window of one of the rooms 
in which my labor awaited me. Never have I seen a picture 
of more stately repose than the huge pile of building presented, 
while the curious vane on the central square tower glittered 
like the outburning flame of its hidden life. The only objec- 
tion I could find to it was that it stood isolated from its own 
park, although the portion next it was kept as trim as the 
smoothest lawn. There was not a door anywhere to be seen, 
except the two gateway entrances, and not a window upon the 
ground floor. All the doors and low windows were either within 
the courts, or opened on the garden which, wdth its terraced 
walks and avenues, and one tiny lawn, surrounded the two fur- 
ther sides of the house, and was itself enclosed by walls. 

I knew the readiest way to the library well enough ; once 
admitted at the outer gate, I had no occasion to trouble the 
servants. The rooms containing the books were amongst the 
bedrooms, and after crossing the great hall, I had to turn my 
back on the stair which led to the ball-room and drawing-room, 
and ascend another to the left, so that I could come and go 
with little chance of meeting any of the family. 

The rooms, I have said, were six, none of them of any great 
size, and all ill-fitted for the purpose. In fact, there was such 
a sense of confinement about the whole arrangement as gave 
me the feeling that any difficult book read there would be un- 
intelligible. Order, however, is only another kind of light, and 
would do much to destroy the impression. Having with prac- 
tical intent surveyed the situation, I saw there was no space for 
action. I must have at least the temporary use of another 
room. Observing that the last of the suite of book rooms 


PREPARATIONS. 


261 


farthest from the armory had still a door into the room be- 
yond, I proceeded to try it, thinking to see at a glance whether 
it would suit me, and whether it was likely to be yielded for 
my purpose. It opened, and, to my dismay, there stood Clara 
Coningham, fastening her collar. She looked sharply round, 
and made a half-indignant step towards me. 

“ I beg your pardon a thousand times. Miss Coningham,” I 
exclaimed. “ Will you allow me to explain, or must I retreat 
unheard ?” 

I was vexed indeed, for, notwithstanding a certain flutter at 
the heart, I had no wish to renew my acquaintance with her. 

“ There must be some fatality about the place, Mr. Cumber- 
mede !” she said, almost with her old merry laugh. “ It 
frightens me.” 

Precisely my own feeling. Miss Coningham. I had no idea 
you were in the neighborhood.” 

“I cannot say so much as that; for I had heard you were 
at The Moat ; but I had no expectation of seeing you — ^least 
of all in this house. 1 suppose you are on the scent of some 
musty old book or other,” she added, approaching the door 
where I stood with the handle in my hand. 

“ My object is an invasion rather than a hunt,” I said, draw- 
ing back that she might enter. 

“Just as it was the last time you and I were here!” she went 
on, with scarcely a pause, and as easily as if there had never 
been any misunderstanding between us. 

I had thought myself beyond any further influence from her 
fascinations, but when I looked in her beautiful face, and heard 
her allude to the past with so much friendliness, and such ap- 
parent unconsciousness of any reason for forgetting it, a tremor 
ran through me from head to foot. I mastered myself suffi- 
ciently to reply, however. 

“ It is the last time you will see it so,” I said ; “ for here stands 
the Hercules of the stable — about to restore it to cleanliness 
and, what is of far more consequence in a library — to order !” 

“You don’t mean it I” she exclaimed with genuine surprise. 
“I’m so glad I’m here!” 


262 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Are you on a visit, then V* 

“Indeed I am ; though how it came about I don’t know. I 
dare say my father does. Lady Brotherton has invited me, 
stiffly, of course, to spend a few weeks during their stay. Sir 
Giles must be in it ; I believe I am rather a favorite with the 
good old man. But I have another fancy: my grandfather is 
getting old ; I suspect my father has been making himself use- 
ful, and this invitation is an acknowledgment. Men always 
buttress their ill-built dignities by keeping poor women in the 
dark; by which means you drive us to infinite conjecture. 
That is how we come to be so much cleverer than you at put- 
ting two and two together and making five.” 

“But,” I ventured to remark, “under such circumstances, 
you will hardly enjoy your visit.” 

“ Oh ! shan’t I ? I shall get fun enough out of it for that. 
They are — all but Sir Giles — they are great fun. Of course, 
they don’t treat me as an equal, but I take it out in amuse- 
ment. You will find you will have to do the same.” 

“Not I. I have nothing to do with them. I am here as a 
skilled workman — one whose work is his sufficient reward. 
There is nothing degrading in that — ^is there ? If I thought 
there was, of course I shouldn’t come.” 

“ You never did anything you felt degrading ?” 

“No.” 

“ Happy mortal I” she said with a sigh — whether humorous 
or real, I could not tell. 

“ I have had no occasion,” I returned. 

“ And yet, as I hear, you have made your mark in litera- 
ture ?” 

“ Who says that? I should not.” 

“ Never mind,” she rejoined, with, as I fancied, the look of 
having said more than she ought. “ But,” she added, “ I wish 
you would tell me in what periodicals you write.” 

“You must excuse me. I do not wish to be first known in 
connection with fugitive things. When first I publish a book, 
you may be assured my name will be on the title-page. Mean- 
time, I must fulfill the conditions of my entree.” 


PREPAEATIONS. 


263 


‘‘And I must go and pay my respects to Lady Brotherton. 
I have only just arrived.” 

“Won’t you find it dull? There’s nobody of man-kind at 
home but Sir Giles.” 

“You are unjust. If Mr. Brotherton had been here I 
shouldn’t have come. I find him troublesome.” 

I thought she blushed, notwithstanding the air of freedom 
with which she spoke. 

“ If he should come into the property to-morrow,” she went 
on, “ I fear you would have little chance of completing your 
work.” 

“ If he came into the property this day six months, I fear 
he would find it unfinished. Certainly what was to do should 
remain undone.” 

“ Don’t be too sure of that. He might win you over. He 
can talk.” 

“ I should not be so readily pleased as another might.” 

She bent towards me, and said in an almost hissing whisper : 

“ Wilfrid, I hate him.” 

I started. She looked what she said. The blood shot to my 
heart, and again rushed to my face. But suddenly she retreated 
into her own room, and noiselessly closed the door. The same 
moment I heard that of a further room open, and presently 
Miss Brotherton peeped in. 

“ How do you do, Mr. Cumbermede ?” she said. “ You are 
already hard at work, I see.” 

I was, in fact, doing nothing. I explained that I could not 
make a commencement without the use of another room. 

“ I will send the housekeeper, and you can arrange with 
her,” she said, and left me. 

In a few minutes Mrs. Wilson entered. Her manner was 
more stiff and formal than ever. We si ook hands in a rather 
limp fashion. 

“ You’ve got your will at last, Mr. Cumbermede,” she said, 
“ I suppose the thing’s to be done !” 

“ It is, Mrs. Wilson, I am happy to say. Sir Giles kindly 
offered me the use of the library, and I took the liberty of re- 


264 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


presenting to him that there was no library until the books 
were arranged.’^ 

“ Why couldn’t you take a book away with you and read it 
in comfort at home ?’^ 

“ How could I take the book home if I couldn’t find it ?” 

“ You could find something worth reading, if that were all 
you wanted.” 

‘‘ But that is not all. I have plenty of reading.” 

“ Then I don’t see what’s the good of it.” 

“ Books are very much like people, Mrs. Wilson. There are 
not so many you want to know all about ; but most could tell 
you things you don’t know. I want certain books in order to 
question them about certain things.” 

“ Well, all I know is, it’ll be more trouble than it’s worth.” 

“ I am afraid it will — to you, Mrs. Wilson ; but though I 
am taking a thousand times your trouble, I expect to be 
well repaid for it.” 

“ I have no doubt of that. Sir Giles is a liberal gentleman.” 

“ You don’t suppose he is going to pay me, Mrs. Wilson ?” 

“ Who else should?” 

** Why, the books themselves, of course.” 

Evidently she thought I was making game of her, for she 
was silent. 

“ Will you show me which room I can have ?” I said. ‘‘ It 
must be as near this one as possible. Is the next particularly 
wanted?” I asked, pointing to the door which led in to Clara’s 
room. 

She went to it quickly, and opened it far enough to put 
her hand in and take the key from the other side, which she 
then inserted on my side, turned in the lock, drew out, and 
put in her pocket. 

“ That room is otherwise engaged,” she said. “ You must 
be content with one across the corridor.” 

“ Very well — if it is not far. I should make slow work of 
it if I had to carry the books a long way.” 

“ You can have one of the footmen to help you,” she said, 
apparently relenting. 


PREPARATIONS. 


265 


“ No, thank you,” I answered. “ I will have no one touch 
the books but myself.” 

“ I will show you one which I think will suit your pur- 
pose,” she said, leading the way. 

It was nearly opposite — a bedroom, sparely furnished. 

“Thank you. This will do — if you will order all the 
things to be piled in that corner.” 

She stood silent for a few moments, evidently annoyed, then 
turned and left the room, saying : 

“ I will see to it, Mr. Cumbermede.” 

Keturning to the books and pulling off my coat, I had soon 
compelled such a cloud of very ancient and smothering dust, 
that when Miss Brotherton again made her appearance her 
figure showed dim through the thick air, as she stood — dis- 
mayed I hoped^ — in the doorway. I pretended to be unaware 
of her presence, and went on beating and blowing, causing yet 
thicker volumes of solid vapor to clothe my presence. She 
withdrew without even an attempt at parley. 

Having heaped several great piles near the door, each com- 
posed of books of nearly the same size, the first rudimentary 
approach to arrangement, I crossed to the other room to see 
what progress had been made. To my surprise and annoy- 
ance, I found nothing had been done. Determined not to 
have my work impeded by the remissness of the servants, 
and seeing I must place myself at once on a proper footing 
in the house, I went to the drawing-room to ascertain, if 
possible, where Sir Giles was. I had of course put on my 
coat, but having no means of ablution at hand, I must have 
presented a very unpresentable appearance when I entered. 
Lady Brotherton half rose, in evident surprise at my in- 
trusion, but at once resumed her seat, saying, as she turned 
her chair half towards the window where the other two 
ladies sat : 

“ The housekeeper will attend to you, Mr. Cumbermede— 
or the butler.” 

I could see that Clara was making inward merriment over 
my appearance and reception. 


266 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Could you tell me, Lady Brotherton,” I said, “ where 1 
should be likely to find Sir Giles ?” 

“ I can give you no information on that point,” she answered 
with consummate stiffness. 

“ I know where he is,” said Clara, rising. “ I will take 
you to him. He is in the study.” 

She took no heed of the glance broadly thrown at her, but 
approached the door. 

I opened it, and followed her out of the room. As soon as 
we were beyond hearing, she burst out laughing. 

“ How dared you show your workman’s face in that draw- 
ing-room ?” she said. “ I am afraid you have much offended 
her ladyship.” 

“ I hope it is for the last time. When I am properly at- 
tended to, I shall have no occasion to trouble her.” 

She led me to Sir Giles’s study. Except newspapers and 
reports of companies, there was in it nothing printed. He 
fose when we entered, and came towards us. 

“ Looking like your work already, Mr. Cumbermede !” he 
said, holding out his hand. 

“ I must not shake hands with you this time. Sir Giles,” 
I returned. “But I am compelled to trouble you. I 
can’t get on for want of attendance. I must have a little 
help.” 

I told him how things were. His rosy face grew rosier, 
and he rang the bell angrily. The butler answered it. 

“ Send Mrs. Wilson here. And I beg, Hurst, you will see 
that Mr. Cumbermede has every attention.” 

Mrs. Wilson presently made her appearance, and stood 
with a flushed face before her master. 

“ Let Mr Cumbermede’s orders be attended to at once, Mrs. 
Wilson.” 

“ Yes, Sir Giles,” she answered, and waited. 

“ I am greatly obliged to you for letting me know,” he 
added, turning to me. “ Pray insist upon proper attention.” 

“ Thank you. Sir Giles. I shall not scruple.” 

“ That will do, Mrs. Wilson. You must not let Mr. Cum- 


PREPARATIONS. 267 

bermede be hampered in his kind labors for my benefit by the 
idleness of my servants.” 

The housekeeper left the room, and after a little chat with 
Sir Giles I went back to the books. Clara had followed Mrs. 
Wilson, partly, I suspect, tor the sake of enjoying her confu- 
sion. 


268 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXXIIL 

ASSISTANCE. 

I RETURNED to my solitary house as soon as the evening 
began to grow too dark for my work, which, i^om the lowness 
of the windows and the age of the glass, was early. All the 
way as I went I was thinking of Clara. Not only had time 
somewhat obliterated the last impression she had made upon 
me, but I had, partly from the infection of Charley’s manner, 
long ago stumbled upon various excuses for her conduct. 
Now I said to myself that she had certainly a look of greater 
sedateness than before. But her expression of dislike to 
Geoffrey Brotherton had more effect upon me than anything 
else, inasmuch as there vanity found room for the soles of 
both her absurdly small feet; and that evening, when I went 
wandering, after my custom, with a volume of Dante in my 
hand, the book remained unopened, and from the form of 
Clara flowed influences mingling with and gathering fresh 
power from those of nature, whose feminine front now brooded 
over me half-withdrawn in the dim, starry night. I remem- 
ber that night so well ! I can recall it now with a calmness 
equal to its own. Indeed, in my memory it seems to belong 
to my mind as much as to the outer world ; or rather the 
night filled both, forming the space in which my thoughts 
moved, as well as the space in which the brilliant thread of 
the sun-lighted crescent hung clasping the earth-lighted bulk 
of the moon. I wandered in the grass until midnight was 
long by, feeling as quietly and peacefully at home as if my 
head had been on the pillow and my soul out in a lovely 
dream of cool delight. We lose much even by the good habits 
we form. What tender and glorious changes pass over our 
sleeping heads unseen ! What moons rise and set in rippled seas 
©f cloud or behind hills of stormy vapor while we are blind J 


ASSISTANCE. 


269 


What storms roll thundering across the airy vault, with no 
eyes for their keen lightnings to dazzle, while we dream of the 
dead who will not speak to us ! But, ah ! I little thought to 
what a dungeon of gloom this lovely night was the jasmine- 
grown porch ! 

The next morning I was glad to think that there was no 
wolf at my door, howling work — work! Moldwarp Hall 
drew me with redoubled attraction ; and instead of waiting 
for the afternoon, which alone I had intended to occupy with 
my new undertaking, I set out to cross the park the moment 
I had finished my late breakfast. Nor could I conceal from 
myself that it was quite as much for the chance of seeing 
Clara now and then as from pleasure in the prospect of an 
ordered library that I repaired thus early to the Hall. In 
the morning light, however, I began to suspect as I walked, 
that, although Clara’s frankness was flattering, it was rather a 
sign that she was heart-whole towards me than that she was 
careless of Brotherton. I began to doubt also whether, after 
our first meeting, which she had carried off so well — cool even 
to kindness, she would care to remember that I was in the 
house, or derive from it any satisfaction beyond what came of 
the increased chances of studying the Brothertons from a 
humorous point of view. Then, after all, why was she there ? 
— and apparently on such familiar terms with a family 
socially so far superior to her own ? The result of my cogi- 
tations was the resolution to take care of myself. But it had 
vanished utterly before the day was two hours older. A 
youth’s wise talk lO himself will not make him a wise man, 
any more than the experience of the father will serve the son’s 
need. 

I was hard at work in my shirt-sleeves, carrying an armful 
of books across the corridor, and thinking whether I had not 
better bring my servant with me in the afternoon, when Clara 
came out of her room. 

“ Here already, Wilfrid !” she exclaimed. “ Why don’t 
you have some of the servants to help you ? You’re doing 
what any one might as Wtll do for you.” 


270 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ If these were handsomely bound,” I answered, “ I should 
not so much mind ; but being old and tattered, no one ought 
to touch them who does not love them.” 

“ Then, I suppose, you wouldn’t trust me with them either, 
for I cannot pretend to anything beyond a second-hand respect 
for them.” 

“ What do you mean by a second-hand respect ?” I asked. 

“ I mean such respect as comes from seeing that a scholar 
like you respects them.” 

“ Then I think I could accord you a second-hand sort of 
trust — under my own eye, that is,” I answered, laughing. 
“ But you can scarcely leave your hostess to help me.” 

“ I will ask Miss Brotherton to come too. She will pretend 
all the respect you desire.” 

“ I made three times the necessary dust in order to frighten 
her away yesterday.” 

“ Ah ! that’s a pity. But I shall manage to overrule her 
objections — that is, if you would really like two tolerably 
educated house-maids to help you.” 

“ I will gladly endure one of them for the sake of the 
other,” I replied. 

“ No compliments, please,” she returned, and left the room. 

In about half an hour she reappeared, accompanied by Miss 
Brotherton. They were in white wrappers, with their dresses 
shortened a little, and their hair tucked under mob caps Miss 
Brotherton looked like a lady’s maid, Clara like a lady acting 
a lady’s maid. I assumed the command at once, pointing out 
to what heaps in the other room those I had grouped in this 
were to be added, and giving strict injunctions as to carrying 
only a few at once, and laying them down with care in regu- 
larly ordered piles. Clara obeyed, with a mock submission. 
Miss Brotherton with a reserve which heightened the impres- 
sion of her dress. I was instinctively careful how I spoke to 
Clara, fearing to compromise her, but she seemed all at once 
to change her r6le, and began to propose, object, and even 
insist upon her own way, drawing from me the threat of imme- 
diate dismission from my service, at which her companion 


ASSISTANCE. 


271 


laughed with an awkwardness showing she regarded the 
pleasantry as a presumption. Before one o’clock the first 
room was almost empty. Then the great bell rang, and Clara, 
coming from the auxiliary chamber, put her head in at the 
door. 

“ W on’t you come to luncheon ?” she said, with a sly arch- 
ness, looking none the less bewitching for a smudge or two on 
her lovely face, or the blackness of the delicate hands which 
she held up like two paws for my admiration. 

“In the servants’ hall? — Workmen don’t sit down with 
ladies and gentlemen. Did Miss Brotherton send you to ask 
me?” 

She shook her head. 

“ Then you had better come and lunch with me ?” 

She shrugged her shoulders. 

“ I hope you will some day honor my little fragment of a 
house. It is a curious old place,” I said. 

“ I don’t like musty old places,” she replied. 

“ But I have heard you speak with no little admiration of 
the Hall : some parts of it are older than my sentry-box.” 

“ I can’t say I admire it at all as a place to live in,” she 
answered curtly. 

“ But I was not asking you to live in mine,” I said — fool- 
ishly arguing. 

She looked annoyed, whether with herself or me I could not 
tell, but instantly answered, — 

“ Some day — when I can without . But I must go and 

make myself tidy, or Miss Brotherton will be fancying I have 
been talking to you.” 

“ And what have you been doing then ?” 

“ Only asking you to come to lunch.” 

“ Will you tell her that ?” 

“ Yes — if she says anything.” 

“ Then you had better make haste and be asked no ques- 
tions.” 

She glided away. I threw on my coat, and re-crossed the 
park. 


272 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


But I was SO eager to see again the fair face in the mob cap, 
that although not at all certain of its reappearance, I told ray 
man to gp at once and bring the mare. He made haste, and 
by the time I had finished my dinner, she was at the door. I 
gave her the rein, and two or three minutes brought me back 
to the Hall, where, having stabled her, I was at my post 
again, I believe, before they had finished luncheon. I had a 
great heap of books ready in the second room to carry into 
the first, and had almost concluded they would not come, 
when I heard their voices — and presently they entered, but 
not in their mob caps. 

“ What an unmerciful master you are !” said Clara, looking 
at the heap. “ I thought you had gone home to lunch.” 

“ I went home to dinner,” I said. “ I get more out of the 
day by dining early.” 

“ How is that, Mr. Cumbermede ?” asked Miss Brotherton, 
with a nearer approach to cordiality than she had yet shown. 

“ I think the evening the best part of the day — too good to 
spend in eating and drinking.” 

“ But,” said Clara, quite gravely, “ are not those the chief 
ends of existence?” 

“ Your friend is satirical. Miss Brotherton,” I remarked. 

“At least, you are not of her opinion, to judge by the time 
you have taken,” she returned. 

“ I have been back nearly an hour,” I said. “ Workmen 
don’t take long over their meals.” 

“ Well, I suppose you don’t want any more of us now,” 
said Clara. “ You will arrange the books you bring from the 
next room upon these empty shelves, I presume.” 

“ No, not yet. I must not begin that until I have cleared 
the very last, got it thoroughly cleaned, the shelves seen to, 
and others put up.” 

“ What a tremendous labor you have undertaken, Mr. 
Cumbermede !” said Miss Brotherton. “ I am quite ashamed 
you should do so much for us.” 

“ I, on the contrary, am delighted to be of any service to 
Sir Giles.” 


ASSISTANCE. 


273 


“ But you don’t expect us to slave all day as we did in the 
morning ?” said Clara. 

“ Certainly not, Miss Coningham. I am too grateful to be 
exacting.” 

“Thank you for that pretty speech. Come, then. Miss 
Brotherton, we must have a walk. We haven’t been out of 
doors to-day.” 

“ Keally, Miss Coningham, I think the least we can do is 
to help Mr. Cumbermede to our small ability.” 

“Nonsense!” (Miss Brotherton positively started at the 
word). “Any two of the maids or men would serve his 
purpose better, if he did not affect fastidiousness. We shan’t 
be allowed to come to-morrow if we overdo it to-day.” 

Miss Brotherton was evidently on the point of saying some- 
thing indignant, but yielded notwithstanding, and I was left 
alone once more. Again I labored until the shadows grew 
thick around the gloomy walls. As I galloped home, I caught 
sight of my late companions coming across the park ; and I 
trust I shall not be hardly judged if I confess that I did sit 
straighter in my saddle, and mind my seat better. Thus ended 
my second day’s work at the library of Moldwarp HalL 


274 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTEK XXXIV. 

AN EXPOSTULATION. 

Neither of the ladies came to me the next morning. As 
far as my work was concerned, I was in considerably less need 
of their assistance, for it lay only between two rooms opening 
into each other. Nor did I feel any great disappointment, for 
so long as a man has something to do, expectation is pleasure 
enough, and will continue such for a long time. It is those who 
are unemployed to whom expectation becomes an agony. I 
went home to my solitary dinner almost resolved to return to 
my original plan of going only in the afternoons. 

I was not thoroughly in love with Clara ; but it was 
certainly the hope of seeing her, and not the pleasure of 
handling the dusty books, that drew me back to the library 
that afternoon. I had got rather tired of the whole affair in 
the morning. It was very hot, and the dust was choking, and 
of the volumes I opened as they passed through my hands, 
not one was of the slightest interest to me. But for the chance 
of seeing Clara I should have lain in the grass instead. 

No one came. I grew weary, and for a change retreated 
into the armory. Evidently, not the slightest heed was paid 
to the weapons now, and I was thinking with myself that when 
I had got the books in order I might give a few days to furbish- 
ing and oiling them, when the door from the gallery opened, 
and Clara entered. 

“ What ! a truant ?” she said. 

“ You take accusation at least by the forelock, Clara. Who 
is the real truant now — if I may suggest a mistaxe ?” 

“ J never undertook anything How many guesses have 
you made as to the cause of your desertion to-day 

“ Well, three or four.” 


AN EXPOSTULATION. 275 

“ Have you made one as to the cause of Miss Brotherton’s 
graciousness to you yesterday ?” 

“ At least I remarked the change.” 

“ I will tell you. There was a short notice of some of your 
writings in a certain magazine which I contrived should fall 
in her way.” 

“ Impossible I” I exclaimed. “ I have never put my name 
to anything.” 

“ But you have put the same name to all your contributions.” 

“ How should the reviewer know it meant me ?” 

“ Your name was never mentioned.” 

I thought she looked a little confused as she said this. 

“ Then how should Miss Brotherton know it meant me ?” 

She hesitated a moment — then answered : 

“ Perhaps from internal evidence. I suppose I must confess 
I told her.” 

“ Then how did you know ?” 

“ I have been one of your readers for a long time.” 

“ But how did you come to know my work ?” 

“ That has oozed out.” 

“ Some one must have told you,” I said. 

“ That is my secret,” she replied, with the air of making it 
a mystery in order to tease me. 

“ It must be aU a mistake,” I said. “ Show me the magazine.” 

‘‘As you won’t take my word for it, I won’t.” 

“ Well, I shall soon find out. There is but one could have 
done it. It is very kind of him, no doubt ; but I don’t like it. 
That kind of thing should come of itself — not through friends.” 

“ Who do you fancy has done it ?” 

“ If you have a secret, so have I.” 

My answer seemed to relieve her, though I could not tell 
what gave me the impression. 

“ You are welcome to yours, and I will keep mine,” she said. 
“ I only wanted to explain Miss Brotherton’s condescension 
yesterday,” 

“ I thought you had been going to explain why you didn’^ 
come to-day.” 


276 


WILFKID CUMBEEMEDE. 


“ That is only a reaction. I have no doubt she thinks she 
went too far yesterday.” 

“ That is absurd. She was civil ; that was all.” 

‘‘ In reading your thermometer, you must know its zero 
first,” she replied sententiously. “ Is the sword you call yours 
there still ?” 

Yes, I call it mine still.” 

“ Why don’t you take it then ? I should have carried it off 
long ago.” 

“ To steal my own would be to prejudice my right,” I re- 
turned. “ But I have often thought of telling Sir Giles about it.” 

“ Why don’t you then?” 

I hardly know My head has been full of other things, 
and any time will do. But I should like to see it in its place 
once more.” 

I had taken it from the wall, and now handed it to her. 

“Is this it?” she said, carelessly. 

“ It is — just as it was carried off my bed that night.” 

“ What room were you in ?” she asked, trying to draw it 
from the sheath. 

“ I can’t tell. I’ve never been in it since.” 

“ You don’t seem to me to have the curiosity natural to 
a ” 

“ To a woman — no,” I said. 

“ To a man of spirit,” she retorted, with an appearance of 
indignation. “ I don’t believe you can tell even how it came 
into your possession ?” 

“ Why shouldn’t it have been in the family from time im- 
memorial ?” 

“ So ! — And you don’t care either to recover it, or to find 
out how you lost it !” 

“ How can I ? Where is Mr. Close ?” 

“ Why, dead — ^years and years ago !” 

“ So I understood. I can’t well apply to him, then, — and 
I am certain no one else knows.” 

“ Don’t be too sure of that. Perhaps Sir Giles ” 

“ I am positive Sir Giles knows nothing about it.” 


AN EXPOSTULATION. 


277 


have reason to think the story is not altogether unknown 
In the family.’^ 

“ Have you told it then ?’* 

“ No. But .! ^ave heard it alluded to.” 

^‘By Sir Giles P 

“No.” 

“ By whom, then ?” 

“ I will answer no .more questions.” 

“ Geoffrey, I suppose ?” 

“ You are not polite. Do you suppose I am bound to tell 
you all I know?” 

“ Not by any means. Only, you oughtn’t to pique a curi- 
osity you don’t mean to satisfy.” 

“ But if I’m not at liberty to say more ? — All I meant to 
say w^as, that if I were you, I would get back that sw^ord.” 

“ You hint at a secret, and yet suppose I could carry off its 
object as I might a rusty nail which any passer-by would be 
made welcome to !” 

“You might take it first, and mention the thing to Sir Giles 
afterwards.” 

“ Why not mention it first?” 

“ Only on the supposition you had not the courage to claim 
it.” 

“ In that case I certainly shouldn’t have the courage to avow 
the deed afterwards. I don’t undei’stand you, Clara.” 

She laughed. 

“ That is always your way,” she said. “ You take every- 
thing so seriously ! Why couldn’t I make a proposition with- 
out being supposed to mean it ?” 

I was not satisfied. There was something short of upright- 
ness in the whole tone of her attempted persuasion — which in- 
deed I could hardly believe to have been so lightly intended as 
she now suggested. The effect on my feeling for her was that 
of a slight frost on the spring blossom. 

She had been examining the hilt with a look of interest, and 
was now for the third time trying to draw the blade from the 
sheath. 


278 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ It’s no use, Clara,” I said. “ It has been too many years 
glued to the scabbard.” 

“ Glued !” she echoed. “ What do you mean ?” 

I did not reply. An expression almost of horror shadowed 
her face, and at the same moment, to my astonishment she 
drew it half way. 

“ Why ! you enchantress !” I exclaimed. “ I never saw so 
much of it before. It is wonderfully bright— when one 
thinks of the years it has been shut in darkness.” 

She handed it to me as it was, saying : 

“ If that weapon was mine, I should never rest until I had 
found out everything concerning it.” 

“That is easily said, Clara; but how can I? My uncle 
knew nothing about it. My grandmother did, no doubt, but 
almost all I can remember her saying was something about my 
great-grandfather and Sir Marmaduke.” 

As I spoke, I tried to draw it entirely, but it would yield no 
farther. I then sought to replace it, but it would not move. 
That it had yielded to Clara’s touch gave it a fresh interest 
and value. 

“ I was sure it had a history,” said Clara. “ Have you no 
family papers ? Your house, you say, is nearly as old as this : 
are there no papers of any kind in it ?” 

“ Yes, a few,” I answered — “ the lease of the farm and ” 

“ Oh ! rubbish !” she said. “ Isn’t the house your own ?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ And have you ever thoroughly searched it ?” 

“ I haven’t had time yet.” 

“Not had time?” she repeated, in a tone of something so 
like the uttermost contempt that I was bewildered. 

“ I mean some day or other to have a rummage in the old 
lumber room,” I said. 

“ Well, I do think that is the least you can do — if only out 
of respect to your ancestors. Depend on it, they don’t like to 
be forgotten any more than other people.” 

The intention I had just announced was, however, but just 
born of her words. I had never yet searched even my grand- 


AN EXPOSTULATION. 


27S 


mother’s bureau, and had but this very moment fancied ther« 
might be papers in some old chest in the lumber-room. That 
room had already begun to occupy my thoughts from another 
point of view, and hence, in part, no doubt the suggestion. I 
was enxious to have a visit from Charley. He might bring 
with him some of our London friends. There was absolutely 
no common room in the house except the hall-kitchen. The 
room we had always called the lumber-room was over it, and 
nearly as large. It had a tall stone chimney-piece, elaborately 
carved, ahd clearly had once been a room for entertainment. 
The idea of restoring it to its original dignity arose in my 
mind; and I hoped th?t, furnished after as antique a fashion 
as I could compass, it would prove a fine room. The win- 
dows were small, to be sure, and the pitch rather low, but the 
whitewashed walls were panneled, and I had some hopes of the 
ceiling 

“ Who knows,” I said to myself, as I walked home that 
evening, “but I may come upon papers? I do remember 
something in the farthest corner that looks like a great chest.” 

Little more had passed between us, but Clara left me with 
the old dissatisfaction beginning to turn itself, as if about to 
awake once more. For the present I hung the half naked 
blade upon the wall, for I dare not force it lest the scabbard 
should go to pieces. 

When I reached home I found a letter from Charley, to the 
effect that, if convenient, he would pay me a visit the following 
week. His mother and sister, he said, had been invited to 
Moldwarp Hall. His father was on the continent for his 
health. Without having consulted them on the matter, which 
might involve them in after difficulty, he would come to me, 
and so have an opportunity of seeing them in the sunshine of 
his father’s absence. I wrote at once I should be de- 
lighted to receive him. 

The next morning I spent with my man in the lumber-room ; 
iiiid before mid-day the rest of the house looked like an old 
curiosity shop — ^it was so littered with odds and ends of dust- 
bloomed antiquity It was hard work, and in the afternoon J 


280 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE, 


found myself disinclined for more exercise of a similar sort 
I had Lilith out, and took a leisurely ride instead. The next 
day and the next also I remained at home. The following 
morning I went again to Moldwarp Hall. 

I had not been busy more than an hour or so when Clara, 
who, I presume, had in passing heard me at work, looked in. 

Who is a truant now ?” she said. ^‘Aren’t you ashamed 
of yourself? Here has Miss Brotherton been almost curious 
concerning your absence, and Sir Giles more than once on the 
point of sending to inquire after you I” 

“ Why didn’t he, then ?” 

“ Oh ! I suppose he was afraid it might look like an asser- 
tion of — of — of baronial rights, or something of the sort. How 
could you behave in such an inconsiderate fashion ?” 

“ You must allow me to have some business of my own.’* 

“ Certainly. But with so many anxious friends, you ought 
to have given a hint of your intentions.’* 

“ I had none, however.” 

‘‘Of which? Friends or intentions?’* 

“ Either.’* 

“ What I No friends ? I verily surprised Miss Pease in 
the act of studying her Cookery for Invalids — in the hope of 
finding a patient in you, no doubt. She wanted to come and 
nurse you, but daredn’t propose it.’* 

“ It was very kind of her.’* 

“No doubt. But then you see she’s ready to commit sui- 
cide any day, poor old thing, but for lack of courage 1” 

“ It must be dreary for her.** 

“ Dreary ! I should poison the old dragon.** 

“Well, perhaps I had better tell you for Miss Pease*s sake, 
who is evidently the only one that cares a straw about me in 
the matter, that possibly I shall be absent a good many days 
this week, and perhaps the next, too.’* 

“ Why then — if I may ask — Mr. Absolute ?** 

“ Because a friend of mine is going to pay me a visit. You 
remember Charley Ogborne, don’t you ? Of course you do. 
You rgpipmber the icercave, I am suit.” 


AN EXPOSTULATION. 


281 


“ Yes I do — quite well,” she answered. 

I fancied I saw a shadow cross her face. 

** When do you expect him ?” she asked, turning away, and 
picking a book from the floor. 

“ In a week or so, I think. He tells me his mother and 
sister are coming here on a visit.” 

“Yes — so I believe — to-morrow, I think. I wonder if 1 
ought to be going. I don’t think I will. I came to please 
them — at all events not to please myself; but as I find it 
pleasanter than I expected, I won’t go without a hint and a 
half at least.” 

“ Why should you ? There is plenty of room.” 

“ Yes ; but don’t you see ? — so many inferiors in the house 
at once might be too much for Madame Dignity. She finds 
one quite enough, I suspect.” 

“ You do not mean that she regards the Osbornes as in- 
feriors ?” 

“Not a doubt of it. Never mind. I can take care of 
myself. Have you any work for me to-day ?” 

“ Plenty, if you are in a mood for it.” 

“ I will fetch Miss Brotherton.” 

“ I can do without Aer.” 

She went, however, and did not return. As I walked home 
to dinner, she and Miss Brotherton passed me in the carnage, 
on their way, as I learned afterward, to fetch the Osborne 
ladies from the rectory, some ten miles oflf. I did not return 
to Moldwarp Hall, but helped Styles in the lumber-room, 
which before night we had almost emptied. 

The next morning I was favored with a little desultory as- 
sistance from the two ladies, but saw nothing of the visitors. 
In the afternoon, and both the following days, I took ray ser- 
vant with me, who got through more work than the two 
together, and we advanced it so far that I was able to leave 
the room next the armory in the hands of the carpenter and 
the housemaid, with sufiScient directions, and did not return 
that week. 


m 


WJLLFKLD CUMBEBMKDJB. 


CHAPTER XXXV. 

A TALK WITH CHARLEY. 

The following Monday, in the evening, Charley arrived, in 
great spirits, more excited indeed than I liked to see him. 
There was a restlessness in his eye which made me especially 
anxious, for it raised a doubt whether the appearance of good 
spirits was not the result merely of resistance to some anxiety. 
But I hoped my companionship, with the air and exercise of 
the country, would help to quiet him again. In the late twi- 
light we took a walk together up and down my field. 

“ I suppose you let your mother know you were coming, 
Charley?” I said. 

“ I did not,” he answered. “ My father must have nothing 
to lay to their charge in case he should hear of our meeting.” 

“ But he has not forbidden you to go home, has he ?” 

“ Xo, certainly. But he as good as told me I was not to go 
home while he was away. He does not wish me to be there 
without his presence to counteract my evil influences. He 
seems to regard my mere proximity as dangerous. I some- 
times wondered whether the severity of his religion may not 
have affected his mind. Almost all madness, you know, turns 
either upon love or religion.” 

“ So I have heard. I doubt it — with men. It may be with 
women. — But you won’t surprise them ? It might startle your 
mother too much. She is not strong, you say. Hadn’t I 
better tell Clara Coningham ? She can let them know you 
are here.” 

“ It would be better.” 

“ What do you say to going there with me to-morrow ? I 
will send my man with a note in the morning.” 

He looked a little puzzled and undetermined, but said at 
length : 


A TALK WITH CHARLEY. 


283 


“ I dare say your plan is the best. How long has Miss Co^ 
ningham been here ?” 

“ About ten days, I think.’* 

He looked thoughtful, and made no answer. 

“ I see, you are afraid of my falling in love with her again,” 
I said. “ I confess I like her much better than I did, but I 
am not quite sure about her yet. She is very bewitching, any- 
how, and a little more might make me lose my heart to her. 
The evident dislike she has to Brotherton would of itself re- 
commend her to any friend of yours or mine.” 

He turned his face away. 

“Do not be anxious about me,” I went on. “The first 
shadowy conviction of any untruthfulness in her, if not suffi- 
cient to change my feelings at once, would at once initiate a 
backward movement in them.” 

He kept his face turned away, and I was perplexed. After 
a few moments of silence, he turned it toward me again, as if 
relieved by some resolution suddenly formed, and said with a 
smile under a still clouded brow . 

“Well, old fellow, we’ll see. It’ll all come right, I dare say. 
Write your note early and we’ll follow it. How glad I slmU 
be to have a glimpse of that blessed mother of mine without 
her attendant dragon !” 

“ For God’s sake don’t talk of your father so. Surely, after 
all he is a good man !” 

“ Then I want a new reading of the word.” 

“ He loves God, at least.” 

“ I won’t stop to inquire,”— said Charley, plunging at once 
into argument, — “ what influence for good it might or might 
not have to love a non-existence. I will only ask — Is it a good 
God he loves, or a bad one ? If the latter, he can hardly be 
called good for loving him.” 

“ But if there be a God at all, he must be a good God.” 

“ Suppose the true God to be the good God, it does not fol- 
low that my father worships Him. There is such a thing as 
worshippiog a false God. At least the Bible recognizes it. For 
my part, I find myself compelled to say, either that the true 


284 


WILFRID CUMBEKMEDE. 


God is not a good God, or that my father does not worship th« 
true God. If you say he worships the God of the Bible, I 
neither admit nor dispute the assertion, but set it aside as alter- 
ing nothing ; for if I admit it, the argument lies thus : my 
father worships a bad God ; my father worships the God of the 
Bible : therefore the God of the Bible is a bad God ; and if 1 
admit the authority of the Bible, then the true God is a bad 
God. If, however, I dispute the assertion that he worships the 
God of the Bible, I am left to show, if I can, that the God of 
the Bible is a good God, and, if I admit the authority of the 
Bible, to worship another than my father’s God. If I do not 
admit the authority of the Bible, there may, for all that, be a 
good God, or, which is next best to a perfectly good God, there 
may be no God at all.” 

“ Put like a lawyer, Charley ; and yet I would venture to 
join issue with your first assertion — on which the whole argu- 
ment is founded — that your father worships a bad God.” 

“ Assuredly what he asserts concerning his God is bad.” 

“ Admitted ; but does he assert only bad things of his God 

“ I daren’t say that. But God is one. You will hardly dare 
the proposition that an infinite being may be partly good and 
partly bad.” 

“No. I heartily hold that God must be one — a proposition 
far more essential than that there is one God — so far at least 
as my understanding can judge. It is only in the limited 
human nature that good and evil can co-exist. But there is 
just the point : we are not speaking of the absolute God, but 
of the idea of a man concerning that God. You could suppose 
yourself utterly convinced of a good God long before your 
ideas of goodness were so correct as to render you incapable of 
attributing anything wrong to that God. Supposing such to 
be the case, and that you came afterward to find that you had 
been thinking something wrong about him, do you think you 
would therefore grant that you had been believing either in a 
wicked or in a false God ?” 

“ Certainly not.” 

“ Then you must give your father the same scope. He attri^ 


A TALK WITH CHARLEY. 


285 


butes what we are absolutely certain are bad things to his Grod 
— and yet he may believe in a good God, for the good in his 
idea of God is alone that in virtue of which he is able to believe 
in him. No mortal can believe in the bad.” 

“He puts the evil foremost in his creed and exhortations.” 

“ That may be. Few people know their own deeper minds. 
The more potent a power in us, I suspect it is the more hidden 
from our scrutiny.” 

“ If there be a God then, Wilfrid, he is very indifferent, to 
what his creatures think of him.” 

“ Perhaps very patient and hopeful, Charley — ^who knows ? 
Perhaps he will not force himself upon them, but help them 
to grow into the true knowledge of him. Your father may 
worship the true God, and yet have only a little of that know- 
ledge.” 

A silence followed. At length — 

“ Thank you for my father,” said Charley. 

“ Thank my uncle,” I said. 

“ For not being like my lather ? — I do,” he returned. 

It was the loveliest evening that brooded round us as we 
walked. The moon had emerged from a rippled sea of gray 
cloud, over which she cast her dull opaline halo. Great masses 
and banks of cloud lay about the rest of the heavens, and in 
the dark rifts between, a star or two were visible, gazing from 
the awful distance. 

“ I wish I could let it into me, Wilfrid,” said Charley, after 
we had been walking in silence for some time along the grass. 

“ Let what into you, Charley ?” 

“ The night and the blue and the stars.” 

“ Why don’t you, then ?” 

“ I hate being taken in. The more pleasant a self-deception 
the less I choose to submit to it.” 

“ That is reasonable. But where lies the deception ?” 

“ I don’t say it’s a deception. I only don’t know that it isn’t.” 

“ Please explain.” 

“ I mean what you call the beauty of the night.” 

“Surely there can be little question of that?” 


286 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Ever so little is enough. Suppose I asked }Ou wherein ita 
beauty consisted : would you be satisfied if I said — In the 
arrangement of the blue and the white, with the sparkles of 
yellow, and the colors about the scarce-visible moon 

“ Certainly not. I should reply that it lay in the gracious 
peace of the whole — troubled only with the sense of some 
lovely secret behind, of which itself was but the half-modeled 
representation, and therefore the reluctant outcome.” 

“ Suppose I rejected the latter half of what you say, admit- 
ting the former, but judging it only the fortuitous result of 
the half-necessary, half-fortuitous concurrences of nature. Sup- 
pose I said : — ^The air which is necessary to our life, happens to 
be blue ; the stars can’t help shining through it and making it 
look deep ; and the clouds are just there because they must be 
somewhere till they fall again ; all which is more agreeable to 
us than fog, because we feel more comfortable in weather of 
the sort, whence, through complacency and habit, we have got 
to call it beautiful : — suppose I said this, would you accept it ?” 

“ Such a theory would destroy my delight in nature alto- 
gether.” 

“ Well, isn’t it the truth ?” 

“ It would be easy to show that the sense of beauty does not 
spring from any amount of comfort ; but I do not care to pur- 
sue the argument from that starting-point. — I confess, when 
you have once waked the questioning spirit, and I look up at 
the clouds and the stars with what I may call sharpened eyes 
— eyes, that is, which assert their seeing, and so render them- 
selves incapable for the time of submitting to impressions, I 
am as blind as any Sadducee could desire. I see blue, and 
white, and gold, and, in short, a tent-roof somewhat ornate. I 
dare say if I were in a miserable mood, having been deceived 
and disappointed, like Hamlet, I should with him see there 
nothing but a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors. But 
I know that when I am passive to its powers, I am aware of a 
presence altogether different — of a something at once southing 
and elevating, powerful to move shame — even contrition and 
the desire of amendment.” 


A TALK WITH CHARLEY, 


287 


“Yes, yes,’^ said Charley hastily. “But let me suppose 
further — and, perhaps you will allow, better — ^that this blue- 
ness — I take a part for the whole — ^belongs essentially and of 
necessity to the atmosphere, itself so essential to our physical 
life ; suppose also that this blue has essential relation to our 
spiritual nature, — takiug for the moment our spiritual nature 
for granted, — suppose, in a word, all nature so related, not 
only to our physical but to our spiritual nature, that it and 
we form an organic whole, full of action and reaction between 
the parts — ^would that satisfy you ? would it enable you to 
look on the sky this night with absolute pleasure ? would you 
want nothing more?’* 

I thought for a little before I answered. 

“ No, Charley,’* I said at last — “ it would not satisfy me. 
For it would indicate that beauty might be after all but the 
projection of my own mind — the name I gave to a harmony 
between that around me and that within me. There would 
then be nothing absolute in beauty. There would be no such 
thing in itself. It would exist only as a phase of me, when I 
was in a certain mood ; and when I was earthly-minded, pas- 
sionate, or troubled, it would be nowhere. But in my best 
moods I feel that in nature lies the form and fashion of a 
peace and grandeur so much beyond anything in me, that they 
rouse the sense of poverty and incompleteness and blame in 
the want of them.** 

“ Do you perceive whither you are leading yourself?’* 

“ I would rather hear you say.’* 

“ To this then — that the peace and grandeur of which you 
speak must be a mere accident, therefore an unreality and 
pure appearance^ or the outcome and representation of a peace 
and grandeur which, not to be found in us, yet exist, and 
make use of this frame of things to set forth and manifest 
themselves in order that we may recognize and desire them.** 

“ Granted — heartily.** 

“ In other words — you lead yourself inevitably to a God 
manifest in nature — not as a powerful being — ^that is a theme 
absolutely without interest to me — but as possessed in himself 


288 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


of the original pre-existent beauty, the counterpart of which 
in us we call art, and who has fashioned us so that we must 
fall down and worship the image of himself which he has 
set up.” 

“ That’s good, Charley. I’m so glad you’ve worked that 
out !” 

“ It doesn’t in the least follow that I believe it. I cannot 
even say I wish I did : — for what I know, that might be to 
wish to be deceived. Of all miseries — to believe in a lovely 
thing and find it not true — that must be the worst.” 

“You might never find it out, though,” I said. “You 
might be able to comfort yourself with it all your life.” 

“ I was wrong,” he cried fiercely. “ Never to find it out 
would be the hell of all hells. Wilfrid, I am ashamed of 
you !” 

“So should I be, Charley, if I had meant it. I only 
wanted to make you speak. I agree with you entirely. But 
I do wish we could be quite sure of it ; — for I don’t believe 
any man can ever be sure of a thing that is not true.” 

“ My father is sure that the love of nature is not only a 
delusion, but a snare. I should have no right to object, were 
he not equally sure of the existence of a God who created and 
rules it. — By the way, if I believed in a God, I should say 
creates, not created . — I told him once, not long ago, when he 
fell out upon nature — he had laid hands on a copy of Endy~ 
mion belonging to me — I don’t know how the devil he got it — 
I asked him whether he thought the devil made the world. 
You should have seen the white wrath he went into at the 
question ! I told him it was generally believed one or the 
other did make the world. He told me God made the world, 
but sin had unmade it. I asked him if it was sin that made 
it so beautiful. He said it was sin that made me think it so 
beautiful. I remarked how very ugly it must have looked 
when God had just finished it ! He called me a blasphemer, 
and walked to the door. I stopped him for a moment by say- 
ing that I thought, after all, he must be right, for according 
to geologists the world must have been a horrible place and 


A TALK WITH CHARLEY. 


289 


full of the most hideous creatures before sin came and made it 
lovely. When he saw my drift, he strode up to me like — well, 
very like his own God, I should think — and was going to 
strike me. I looked him in the eyes without moving, as if he 
had been a madman. He turned and left the room. I left 
the house, and went back to London the same night.” 

“ Oh, Charley ! Charley ! that was too bad !” 

“ I knew it, Wilfrid, and yet I did it ! But if your father 
had made a downright coward of you, afraid to speak the 
truth, or show what you were thinking, you also might find 
that when anger gave you a fictitious courage, you could not 
help breaking out. It’s only another form of cowardice, I 
know ; and I am as much ashamed of it as you could wish me 
to be.” 

“ Have you made it up with him since ?” 

“ I’ve never seen him since.” 

“ Haven’t you written, then ?” 

“No. Where’s the use? He never would understand me. 
He knows no more of the condition of my mind than he does 
of the other side of the moon. If I ofiered such, he would 
put aside all apology for my behaviour to him — repudiating 
himself, and telling me it was the wrath of an ofiended God, 
not of an earthly parent, I had to deprecate. If I told him 
I had only spoken against his false God — how far would that 
go to mend the matter, do you think ?” 

“ Not far, I must allow. But I am very sorry.” 

“ I wouldn’t care if I could be sure of anything — or even 
sure that if I were sure, I shouldn’t be mistaken.” 

“I’m afraid you’re very morbid, Charley.” 

“ Perhaps. But you cannot deny that my father is sure of 
things that you believe utterly false.” 

“ I suspect, however, that if we were able to get a bird’s-eye 
view of his mind and all its workings, we should discover that 
what he called assurance was not the condition you would call 
such. You would find it was not the certainty you covet.” 

“ I have thought of that, and it is my only comfort. But I 
am sick of the whole subject. See that cloud ! isn’t it like 
19 


290 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Death on the pale horse? What fun it must be for the 
cherubs, on such a night as this, to go blowing the clouds into 
fantastic shapes with their trumpet cheeks.” 

Assurance was ever what Charley wanted, and unhappily 
the sense of intellectual insecurity weakened his moral action. 

Once more I reveal a haunting uneasiness in the expression 
of a hope that the ordered character of the conversation I 
have just set down may not render it incredible to my reader. 
I record the result alone. The talk itself was far more desul- 
tory, and in consequence of questions, objections, and explana- 
tions, divaricated much from the comparatively direct line I 
have endeavored to give it here. In the hope of making my 
readers understand both Charley and myself, 1 have sought to 
make the winding and rough path straight and smooth. 


TAPESTRY. 


291 


CHAPTER XXXVL 

TAPESTRY. 

Having heard what I was about at the Hall, Charley 
expressed a desire to take a share in my labors, especially as 
thereby he would be able to see more of his mother and sister. 
I took him straight to the book-rooms, and we were hard at 
work when Clara entered. 

“Here is your old friend, Charley Osborne,” I said. “ You 
remember Miss Coningham, Charley, I know.” 

He advanced in what seemed a strangely embarrassed — 
indeed rather sheepish manner, altogether unlike his usual 
bearing. I attributed it to a doubt whether Clara would 
acknowledge their old acquaintance. On her part, she met 
him with some frankness, but I thought also a rather embar- 
rassed look, which was the more surprising as I had let her 
know he was coming. But they shook hands, and in a little 
while we were all chatting comfortably. 

“ Shall I go and tell Mrs. Osborne you are here?” she asked. 

“ Yes, if you please,” said Charley, and she went. 

In a few minutes Mrs. Osborne and Mary entered. The 
meeting was full of affection, but to my eye looked like a meet- 
ing of the living and the dead in a dream — there was such an 
evident sadness in it, as if each was dimly aware that they met 
but in appearance and were in reality far asunder. I could 
not doubt that however much they loved him, and however 
little they sympathized with his father’s treatment of him, his 
mother and sister yet regarded him as separated from them by 
a great gulf — that of culpable unbelief. But they seemed 
therefore only the more anxious to please and serve him — their 
anxiety revealing itself in an eagerness painfully like the ser- 
vice offered to one whom the doctors have given up, and who 
may now have any indulgence he happens to fancy. 


292 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I say, mother,” said Charley, who seemed to strive after 
an airier manner even than usual — “ couldn^t you come and 
help us ? It would be so jolly !” 

“No, my dear; I mustn’t leave Lady Brotherton. That 
would be rude, you know. But I dare say Mary might.” 

“ Oh, please, mamma! I should like it so much — especially 
if Clara would stop! But perhaps Mr. Cumbermede — we 
ought to have asked him first.” 

“ Yes — ^to be sure — he’s the foreman,” said Charley. “ But 
he’s not a bad fellow, and won’t be disobliging. Only you 
must do as he tells you, or it’ll be the worse for us all. 1 
know him.” 

“ I shall be delighted,” I said. “ I can give both the ladies 
plenty to do. Indeed I regard Miss Coningham as one of my 
hands already. Won’t Miss Brotherton honor us to-day. Miss 
Coningham ?” 

“ I will go and ask her,” said Clara. 

They all withdrew. In a little while I had four assistants, 
and we got on famously. The carpenter had been hard at 
work, and the room next the armory, the oak-paneling of 
which had shown considerable signs of decay, had been 
repaired, and the shelves, which were in tolerable condition, 
were now ready to receive their burden, and reflect the first 
rays of a dawning order. 

Plenty of talk went on during the dusting and arranging 
of the books by their size, which was the first step towards a 
cosmos. There was a certain playful naivet4 about Charley’s 
manner .and speech when he was happy which gave him an 
instant advantage with women, and even made the impression 
of wit where there was only grace. Although he was per- 
fectly capable, however of engaging to any extent in the 
badinage which has ever been in place between young men 
and women since dawning humanity was first aware of a 
lovely difierence, there was always a certain indescribable 
dignity about what he said which I now see could have come 
only from a believing heart. I use the word advisedly, but 
would rather my reader should find what I mean than require 


TAPESTRY. 


293 


me to explain it fully. Belief to my mind lies chiefly in the 
practical recognition of the high and pure. 

Miss Brotherton looked considerably puzzled sometimes, and 
indeed out of her element. But her dignity had no chance 
with so many young people, and was compelled to thaw 
visibly; and while growing more friendly with the others, 
she could not avoid unbending towards me also, notwithstand- 
ing I was a neighbor and the son of a dairy-farmer. 

Mary Osborne took little part in the fun beyond a smile, or 
in the more solid conversation beyond an assent or an or- 
dinary remark. I did not find her very interesting. An on- 
looker would probably have said she lacked expression. But 
the stillness upon her face bore to me the shadow of a reproof. 
Perhaps it was only a want of sympathy with what was going 
on around her. Perhaps her soul was either far withdrawn 
from its present circumstances, or not yet awake to the 
general interests of life. There was little in the form or hue 
of her countenance to move admiration, beyond a complexion 
without spot. It was very fair and delicate, with little more 
color in it than in the white rose, which but the faintest 
warmth redeems from dead whiteness. Her features were 
good in form, but in no way remarkable ; her eyes were of the 
so-called hazel, which consists of a mingling of brown and 
green ; her figure was good but seemed unelastic, and she had 
nothing of her brother’s gayety or grace of movement or ex- 
pression. I do not mean that either her motions or her speech 
were clumsy — there was simply nothing to remark in them 
beyond the absence of anything special. In a word, I did 
not find her interesting, save as the sister of my delight- 
ful Charley, and the sharer of his mother’s griefs concerning 
him. 

“ If I had as good help in the afternoon,” I said, “ we 
should have all the books on the shelves to-night, and be able 
to set about assorting them to-morrow.” 

“ I am sorry I cannot come this afternoon,” said Miss Bro- 
therton. “ I should have been most happy if I could. It is 
really very pleasant — notwithstanding the dust. But Mrs. 


294 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Osborne and mamma want me to go with them to Minster- 
combe. You will lunch with us to-day, won’t you?” she 
added, turning to Charley. 

“ Thank you, Miss Brotherton,” he replied ; “ I should 
have been delighted, but I am not my own master — I am 
Cumbermede’s slave at present, and can eat and drink only 
when and where he chooses.” 

“You must stay with your mother, Charley,” I said. “You 
cannot refuse Miss Brotherton.” 

She could thereupon scarcely avoid extending the invitation 
to me, but I declined it on some pretext or other, and I was 
again, thanks to Lilith, back from my dinner before they had 
finished luncheon. The carriage was at the door when I rode 
up, and the moment I heard it drive away, I went to the 
dining-room to find my coadjutors. The only person there 
was Miss Pease. A thought struck me. 

“ Won’t you come and help us. Miss Pease?” I said. “I 
have lost one of my assistants, and I am very anxious to get 
the room we are at now so far finished to-night.” 

A smile found its way to her cold eyes, and set the blue 
sparkling for one briefest moment. 

“ It is very kind of you, Mr. Cumbermede, but ” 

“ Kind !” I exclaimed — “ I want your help. Miss Pease.” 

“I’m afraid ” 

“ Lady Brotherton can’t want you now. Do oblige me. 
You will find it fun.” 

She smiled outright — evidently at the fancy of any relation 
between her and fun. 

“ Do go and put a cap on, and a cotton dress, and come,” 
I persisted. 

Without another word she left the room. I was still alone 
in the library when she came to me, and having shown her 
what I wanted, we were already busy when the rest arrived. 

“ O Peasey ! Are you there ?” said Clara, as she entered 
— not unkindly. 

“ I have got a substitute for Miss Brotherton, you see, Clara 
— Miss Coningham — I beg your pardon.” 


TAPESTRY. 


295 


“ There’s no occasion to beg my pardon. Why shouldn’t 
you call me Clara if you like ? It is my name.” 

“ Charley might be taking the same liberty,” I returned, 
extemporizing a reason. 

“ And why shouldn't Charley take the same liberty ?” she 
retorted. 

“ Por no reason that I know,” I answered, a trifle hurt, “ if 
it be agreeable to the lady.” 

‘‘ And the gentleman,” she amended. 

“ And the gentleman,” I added. 

“ Very well. Then we are all good boys and girls. Now 
Peasey, I’m very glad you’re come. Only mind you get back 
to your place before the ogress returns, or you’ll have your 
head snapped ofi*.” 

Was I right, or was it the result of the slight ofience I had 
taken ? Was she the gracious, graceflil, naive, playful, daring 
woman — or could she be — or had she been just the least little 
bit vulgar? I am afraid I was then more sensitive to 
vulgarity in a woman, real or fancied, than even to wicked- 
ness — at least I thought I was. At all events, the first con- 
viction of anything common or unrefined in a woman would 
at once have placed me beyond the sphere of her attraction. 
But I had no time to think the suggestion over now ; and in a 
few minutes — whether she saw the cloud on my face I cannot 
tell — Clara had given me a look and a smile which banished 
the possibility of my thinking about it for the present. 

Miss Pease worked more diligently than any of the party. 
She seldom spoke, and when she did, it was in a gentle, sub- 
dued, almost mournful tone ; but the company of the young 
people without the restraint of her mistress was evidently 
grateful to what of youth yet remained in her oppressed being. 

Before it was dark we had got the books all upon the 
shelves, and leaving Charley with the ladies, I walked home. 

I found Styles had got everything out of the lumber-room 
except a heavy oak chest in the corner, which, our united 
strength being insufficient to displace it, I concluded was fixed 
to the floor. I collected all the keys my aunt had left behind 


296 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


her, but sought the key of this chest in vain. For my uncle, 
I never saw a key in his possession. Even what little money 
he might have in the house, was only put away at the back 
of an open drawer. For the present, therefore, we had to 
leave it undisturbed. 

When Charley came home, we went to look at together. 
It was of oak, and somewhat elaborately carved. 

I was very restless in bed that night. The air was close 
and hot, and as often as I dropped half asleep I awoke again 
with a start. My thoughts kept stupidly running on the old 
chest. It had mechanically possessed me. I felt no disturb- 
ing curiosity concerning its contents ; I was not annoyed at 
the want of the key ; it was only that, like a nursery rhyme 
that keeps repeating itself over and over in the halt-sleeping 
brain, this chest kept rising before me till I was out of 
patience with its intrusiveness. It brought me wide awake at 
last ; and I thought, as I could not sleep, I would have a 
search for the key. I got out of bed, put on my dressing- 
gown and slippers, lighted my chamber candle, and made an 
inroad upon the contents of the closet in my room, which kad 
apparently remained undisturbed since the morning when I 
missed my watch. I believe I had never entered it since^ 
Almost the first thing I came upon was the pendulum, which 
woke a strange sensation for which I could not account, until 
by slow degrees the twilight memory of the incidents con- 
nected with it half dawned upon me. I searched the whole 
place, but not a key could I find. 

I started violently at the sound of something like a groan, 
and for the briefest imaginable moment forgot that my grannie 
was dead, and thought it must come from her room. It may 
be remembered that such a sound had led me to her in the 
middle of the night on which she died. Whether I really 
heard the sound, or only fancied I heard it — by some half me- 
chanical action of the brain, roused by the association of ideas 
— I do not even yet know. It may have been changed or 
expanded into a groan, from one of those innumerable sounds 
heard in every old house in the stillness of the night ; for such. 


TAPESTRY. 


297 


m the absence of the correction given by other sounds, assume 
place and proportion as it were at their pleasure. What lady 
has not at midnight mistaken the trail of her own dress on the 
carpet, in a silent house, for some tumult in a distant room ? 
Curious to say, however, it now led to the same action as the 
groan I had heard so many years before ; for I caught up my 
candle at once, and took my way down to the kitchen, and up 
the winding stair behind the chimney to grannie’s room. 
Strange as it may seem, I had not been in it since my return ; 
for my thoughts had been so entirely occupied with other 
things, that, although I now and then looked forward with 
considerable expectation to a thorough search of the place, 
especially of the bureau, I kept it up as a bonne bouehe, the 
anticipation of which was consolation enough for the post- 
ponement. 

I confess it was with no little quavering of the spirit that I 
Bought this chamber in the middle of the night. For, by its 
association with one who had from my earliest recollection 
leemed like something forgotten and left behind in the onward 
rush of life, it was, far more than anything else in the house, 
like a piece of the past embedded in the present — a fragment 
that had been, by some eddydn the stream of time, prevented 
from gliding away down its course, and left to lie forever in a 
cranny of the solid shore of unmoving space. But although 
subject to more than the ordinary tremor at the thought of 
unknown and invisible presences, I must say for myself that I 
had never yielded so far as to allow such tremor to govern my 
actions. Even in my dreams I have resisted ghostly terrors, 
and can recall one in which I so far conquered a lady ghost 
who took every means of overcoming me with terror, that at 
length she fell in love with me, whereupon my fear vanished 
utterly — a conceited fancy, and as such let it fare. 

I opened the door then with some trembling, half expecting 
to see first the white of my grannie’s cap against the tall back 
of her dark chair. But my senses were sound, and no such 
illusion seized me. All was empty, cheerless and musty. 
Grannie’s bed, with its white curtains^, looked as if it were 


298 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


mouldering away after her. The dust lay thick on the coun- 
terpane of patchwork silk. The bureau stood silent with all 
its secrets. In the fireplace was the same brushwood and coals 
which Nannie laid the morning of grannie’s death; inter- 
rupted by the discovery of my presence, she had left it, and 
that fire had never been lighted. Half for the sake of com- 
panionship, half because the air felt sepulchral and I was 
thinly clad, I put my candle to it and it blazed up. My 
courage revived, and after a little more gazing about the 
room, I ventured to sit down in my grannie’s chair and watch 
the growing fire. Warned however by the shortness of my 
candle, I soon rose to proceed with my search, and turned to- 
wards the bureau. 

Here, however, the same difliculty occurred. The top of 
the bureau was locked as when I had last tried it, and not one 
of my keys would fit it. At a loss what to do or where to search, 
I dropped again into the chair by the fire, and my eyes went 
roving about the room. They fell upon a black dress which 
hung against the wall. At the same moment I remembered 
that when she gave me the watch, she took the keys of the 
bureau from her pocket. I went to the dress and found a 
pocket, not indeed in the dress, but hanging under it from the 
same peg. There her keys were! It would have been a 
marvel to me how my aunt came to leave them undisturbed 
all those years, but for the instant suggestion that my uncle 
must have expressed a wish to that effect. With eager hand 
I opened the bureau. Besides many trinkets in the drawers, 
some of them of exceedingly antique form, and, I fancied of 
considerable value, I found in the pigeon-holes what I was far 
more pleased to discover — a good many letters, carefiilly tied 
in small bundles, with ribbon which had lost all determinable 
color. These I resolved to take an early opportunity of read- 
ing, but replaced for the present, and, having come at last 
upon one hopeful looking xey, I made haste to return before 
my candle, which was already flickering in the socket, 
should go out altogether, and leave me darkling. When 
I reached the kitchen, however, I found the gray dawn 


TAPESTRY. 


299 


already breaking. I retired once more to my chamber, and 
was soon fast asleep. 

In the morning, my first care was to try the key. It fitted. 
I oiled it well, and then tried the lock. I had to use consid- 
erable force, but at last there came a great clang that echoed 
through the empty room. When I raised the lid, I knew by 
the weight it was of iron. In fact, the whole chest was iron with 
a casing of oak. The lock threw eight bolts, which laid hold 
of a rim that ran all around the lip of the chest. It was full 
of “ very ancient and fish-like ’’ papers and parchments. I do 
not know whether my father or grandfather had ever dis- 
turbed them, but I am certain my uncle never had, for as far 
back as I can remember, the part of the room where it stood 
was filled with what had been, at one time and another, con- 
demned as lumber. 

Charley was intensely interested in the discovery, and 
would have sat down at once to examine the contents of the 
chest, had I not persuaded him to leave them till the after- 
noon, that we might get on with our work at the Hall. 

The second room was now ready for the carpenter, but, 
having had a peep of tapestry behind the shelves, a new 
thought had struck me. If it was in good preservation, it 
would be out of the question to hide it behind books. 

I fear I am getting tedious. My apology for difiuseness in 
this part of my narrative is that some threads of the fringe of 
my own fate show every now and then in the record of these 
proceedings. I confess also that I hang back from certain 
things which are pressing nearer with their claim for record. 

When we reached the Hall, I took the carpenter with me, 
and had the book-shelves taken down. To my disappoint- 
ment we found that an oblong piece of some size was missing 
from the centre of the tapestry on one of the walls. That 
which covered the rest of the room was entire. It was all of 
good Gobelin work— somewhat tame in color. The damaged 
portion represented a wooded landscape, with water and reedy 
flowers and aquatic fowl, towards which in the distance came 
a hunter with a crossbow in his hand, and a queer lurcher* 


300 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


looking dog bounding uncouthly at bis heels : the edge of the 
vacant space cut off the dog’s tail and the top of the man’s 
crossbow. 

I went to find Sir Giles. He was in the dining-room, where 
they had just finished breakfast. 

“ Ah, Mr. Cumbermede !” he said, rising as I entered, and 
holding out his hand — “ here already ?” 

“We have uncovered some tapestry. Sir Giles, and I want 
you to come and look at it, if you please.” 

“I will,” he answered. “Would any of you ladies like to 
go and see it ?” 

His daughter and Clara rose. Lady Brotherton and Mi-s. 
Osborne sat still. Mary, glancing at her mother, remained 
seated also. 

“Won’t you come. Miss Pease?” I said. 

She looked almost alarmed at the audacity of the proposal, 
and murmured, “ No, thank you,” with a glance at Lady Broth- 
erton, which appeared as involuntary, as it was timid. 

“ Is my son with you ?” asked Mrs. Osborne. 

I told her he was. 

“ I shall look in upon you before the morning is over,” she 
said quietly. 

They were all pleased with the tapestry, and the ladies of- 
fered several conjectures as to the cause of the mutilation. 

“ It would be a shame to cover it up again — would it not. 
Sir Giles ?” I remarked. 

“ Indeed it would,” he assented. 

“ If it weren’t for that broken piece,” said Clara. “ That 
spoils it altogether. I should have the books up again as 
soon as possible.” 

“ It does look shabby,” said Charley. “ I can’t say I should 
enjoy having anything so defective always before my eyes.” 

“We must have it taken down very carefully, Hobbes,” said 
Sir Giles, turning to the carpenter. 

“ Must it come down. Sir Giles ?” I interposed. “ I think 
it would be risky. No one knows how long it has been there, 
and though it might hang where it is for a century yet, and 


TAPESTRY. 


301 


look nothing the worse, it can^t be strong, and at best we could 
not get it down without some injury, while it is a great chance 
if it would fit any other place half as well.’* 

“ What do you propose, then ?” 

“ This is the largest room of the six, and the best lighted — 
with that lovely oriel window; I would venture to propose, 
Sir Giles, that it should be left clear of books and fitted up 
as a reading-room.’* 

“ But how would you deal with that frightful lacuna in the 
tapestry ?” said Charley. 

“ Yes,” said Sir Giles ; “ it won’t look handsome, I fear — do 
what you will.” 

“ I think I know how to manage it,” I said. “ If I succeed 
to your satisfaction, will you allow me to carry out the project?” 

“ But what are we to do with the books then? We shan’t 
have room for them.” 

“ Couldn’t you let me have the next room beyond ?’* 

“You mean to turn me out, I suppose,” said Clara. 

“ Is there tapestry on your walls ?” I asked. 

“ Not a thread — all wainscot — painted.” 

“ Then your room would be the very thing !” 

“ It is much larger than any of these,” she said. 

“ Then do let us have it for the library. Sir Giles,” I en- 
treated. 

“ I will see what Lady Brotherton says,” he replied, and 
left the room. 

In a few minutes we heard his step returning. 

“ Lady Brotherton has no particular objection to giving up 
the room you want,” he said. “Will you see Mrs. Wilson, 
Clara, and arrange with her for your accommodation?” 

“ With pleasure. I don’t mind where I am put — except it 
be in Lord Edward’s room — where the ghost is.” 

“ You mean the one next to ours ? There is no ghost there, 
I assure you,” said Sir Giles, laughing, as he again left the 
room with short, heavy steps. — “Manage it all to your own 
mind, Mr. Cumbermede. I shall be satisfied,” he called back 
as he went. 


302 


WILFRID CUMRERMEDE. 


‘‘ Until fiirther notice,” I said with grandiloquence, “ I re- 
quest that no one may come into this room. If you are kind 
enough to assort the books, we put up yesterday, oblige me by 
going through the armory. I must find Mrs. Wilson.” 

“ I will go with you,” said Clara. “ I wonder where the old 
thing will want to put me. I’m not going where I don’t like, 
I can tell her,” she added, following me down the stair and 
across the hall and the court. 

We found the housekeeper in her room. I accosted her in 
a friendly way. She made but a bare response. 

Would you kindly show me where I slept that night I 
lost my sword, Mrs. Wilson ?” I said. 

“ I know nothing about your sword, Mr. Cumbermede,” she 
answered, shaking her head and pursing up her mouth. 

“ I don’t ask you anything about it, Mrs. Wilson ; I only 
ask you where I slept the night I lost it.” 

“ Really, Mr. Cumbermede, you can hardly expect me to 
remember in what room a visitor slept — ^let me see — ^it must 
be twelve or fifteen years ago ! I do not take it upon me.” 

Oh ! never mind then. I referred to the circumstances of 
that night, thinking they might help you to remember the 
room ; but it is of no consequence ; I shall find it for myself. 
Miss Coningham will, I hope, help me in the search. She 
knows the house better than I do.” 

“ I must attend to my own business first, if you please, sir,” 
said Clara. “ Mrs. Wilson, I am ordered out of my room by 
Mr. Cumbermede. You must find me fresh quarters, if you 
please.” 

Mrs. Wilson stared. 

“ Do you mean, miss, that you want your things moved to 
another bed-room ?” 

“ That is what I mean, JMrs. Wilson.” 

“ I must see what Lady Brotherton says to it, miss.” 

“ Do, by all means.” 

I saw that Clara was bent on annoying her old enemy, and 
interposed. 

“ Sir Giles and Lady Brotherton have agreed to let me hava 


TAPESTRY. 


303 


Miss Coningham's room for an addition to the library, Mr s. 
Wilson,” I said. 

She looked very grim, but made no answer. We turned 
and left her. She stood for a moment as if thinking, and 
then, taking down her bunch of keys, followed us. 

“ If you will come this way,” she said, stopping just behind 
us at another door in the court, I think I can show you the 
room you want. But really, Mr. Cumbermede, you are turn- 
ing the place upside down. If I had thought it would come 
to this ” 

“ I hope to do so a little more yet, Mrs. Wilson,” I inter- 
rupted. “ But I am sure you will be pleased with the result.” 

She did not reply, but led the way up a stair, across the 
little open gallery, and by passages I did not remember to the 
room I wanted. It was in precisely the same condition as 
when I occupied it. 

‘‘ This is the room, I believe,” she said, as she unlocked and 
threw open the door. “Perhaps it would suit you. Miss 
Coningham ?” 

“ Not in the least,” answered Clara. “ WTio knows which of 
my small possessions might vanish before the morning ?” 

The housekeeper’s face grew turkey-red with indignation. 

“ Mr. Cumbermede has been filling your head with some of 
his romances, I see, Miss Clara !” 

I laughed, for I did not care to show myself offended with 
her rudeness. 

“ Never you mind,” said Clara ; “ I am not going to sleep 
there.” 

“ Very good,” said Mrs. Wilson, in a tone of offence severely 
restrained. 

“ Will you show me the way to the library ?” I requested. 

“ I will,” said Clara. “ I know it as well as Mrs. Wilson — 
every bit.” 

“ Then that is all I want at present, Mrs. Wilson,” I said, 
as we came out of the room. “ Don’t lock the door though, 
please,” I added. “ Or, if you do, give me the key.” 

She left the door open, and us in the passage. Clara led 


304 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


me to the library. There we found Charley waiting oui 
return. 

“ Will you take that little boy to his mother, Clara ?” I 
said. “I don’t want him here to-day. We’ll have a look 
over those papers in the evening, Charley.” 

“ That’s right,” said Clara. “ I hope Charley will help you 
to a little rational interest in your own afiairs. I am quite 
bewildered to think that an author, not to say a young man, 
the sole remnant of an ancient family, however humble, 
shouldn't even know whether he had any papers in the house 
or not.” 

“ We’ve come upon such a glorious nest of such addled eggs, 
Clara. Charley and I are going to blow them to-night,” I said. 

“You never know when such eggs are addled,” retorted 
Clara. “ You’d better put them under some sensible fowl or 
other first,” she added, looking back from the door as they 
went. 

I turned to the carpenter’s tool basket, and taking from it 
an old chisel, a screw-driver, and a pair of pincers, went back 
to the room we had just left. 

There could be no doubt about it. There was the tip of 
the dog’s tail, and the top of the hunter’s crossbow. 

But my reader may not have retained in her memory the 
facts to which I implicitly refer. I would therefore, to spare 
repetition, beg her to look back to Chapter XIV., containing 
the account of the loss of my sword. 

In the consternation caused me by the discovery that this 
loss was no dream of the night, I had never thought of exam- 
ining the wall of the chamber to see whether there was in it 
a door or not ; but I saw now at once plainly enough that 
the inserted patch did cover a small door. Opening it, I found 
within, a creaking wooden stair, leading up to another low 
door, which, fashioned like the door of a companion, opened 
upon the roof: — nowhere, except in the towers, had the Hall 
more than two stories. As soon as I had drawn back the bolt 
and stepped out, I found myself standing at the foot of an 
ornate stack of chimneys, and remembered quite well having 


TAPESTRY. 


305 


tried the door that night Clara and I were shut out on the 
leads — ^the same night on which my sword was stolen. 

For the first time the question now rose in my mind whether 
Mrs. Wilson could have been in league with Mr. Close. Was 
it likely I should have been placed in a room so entirely fitted 
to his purposes by accident ? But I could not imagine any 
respectable woman running such a risk of terrifying a child 
out of his senses, even if she could have connived at his being 
robbed of what she might well judge unsuitable for his posses- 
sion. Descending again to the bed-room, I set to work with 
my tools. The utmost care was necessary, for the threads were 
weak with old age. I had only one or two slight mishaps, how- 
ever, succeeding on the whole better than I had expected. 
Leaving the door denuded of its covering, I took the patch on 
my arm, and again sought the library. Hobbes’s surprise, and 
indeed pleasure, when he saw that my plunder not only fitted 
the gap, but completed the design, was great. I directed him 
to get the whole piece down as carefully as he could, and went 
to extract, if possible, a favor from Lady Brotherton. 

She was of course very stiff — no doubt she would have called 
it dignified ; but I did all I could to please her, and perhaps 
in some small measure succeeded. After representing, amongst 
other advantages, what an addition a suite of rooms filled with 
a valuable library must be to the capacity of the house for the 
reception and entertainment of guests, I ventured at last to 
beg the services of Miss Pease for the repair of a bit of the 
tapestry. 

She rang the bell, sent for Miss Pease, and ordered her, in a 
style of the coldest arrogance, to put herself under my direc- 
tion. She followed me to the door in the meekest manner, but 
declined the arm I offered. As we went I explained what I 
wanted, saying I could not trust it to any hands but those of a 
lady, expressing a hope that she would not think I had taken 
too great a liberty, and begging her to say nothing about the 
work itself, as I wished to surprise Sir Giles and my assistants. 
She said she would be most happy to help me, but when she 
saw how much was wanted, she did look a little dismayed. 

20 


306 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


She went and fetched her work-basket at once, however, and 
set about it, tacking the edges to a strip of canvas, in prepara- 
tion for some kind of darning, which would not, she hoped, be 
unsightly. 

For a whole week she and the carpenter were the only per^ 
sons I admitted, and while she gave to her darning every mo- 
ment she could redeem from her attendance on Lady Brother- 
ton, the carpenter and I were busy, — he cleaning and polish- 
ing, and 1 ranging the more deserted parts of the house to find 
furniture suitable for our purpose. In Clara’s room was an 
old Turkey carpet which we appropriated, and when we had 
the tapestry up again, which Miss Pease had at length restored 
in a marvelous manner — surpassing my best hopes, and more 
like healing than repairing, — the place was to my eyes a very 
nest of dusky harmonies. 


THE OLD CHEST. 


307 


CHAPTER XXXVII. 

THE OLD CHEST. 

I CANNOT help dwelling for a moment on the scene, although 
it is not of the slightest consequence to my story, when Sir 
Giles and Lady Brotherton entered the reading-room of the 
resuscitated library of Moldwarp Hall. It was a bright day 
of autumn. Outside all was brilliant. The latticed oriel 
looked over the lawn and the park, where the trees had begun 
to gather those rich hues which could hardly be the heralds 
of death if it were the ugly thing it appears. Beyond the 
fading woods rose a line of blue heights meeting the more 
ethereal blue of the sky, now faded to a colder and paler tint. 
The dappled skins of the fallow deer glimmered through the 
trees, and the whiter ones among them cast a light round them 
in the shadows. Through the trees that on one side descended 
to the meadow below, came the shine of the water where the 
little brook had spread into still pools. All without was bright 
with sunshine and clear air. But when you turned, all was 
dark, sombre, and rich like an autumn ten times faded. 
Through the open door of the next room on one side, you saw 
the shelves fiill of books, and from beyond, through the nar- 
row uplifted door, came the glimmer of the weapons on the 
wall of the little armory. Two ancient tapestry-covered 
settees, in which the ravages of moth and worm had been 
met by skillful repair of chisel and needle, a heavy table of 
oak, with carved sides, as black as ebony, and a few old, 
straight-backed chairs were the sole furniture. 

Sir Giles expressed much pleasure, and Lady Brotherton, 
beginning to enter a little into my plans, was more gracious 
than hitherto. 

“We must give a party as soon as you have finished, Mr. 
Cumbermede,” she said ; “ and ” 


308 


WILFEID CUMBEKMEDE. 


“ That will be some time yet,” I interrupted, not desiring 
the invitation she seemed about to force herself to utter; ‘‘and 
I fear there are not many in this neighborhood who will ap- 
preciate the rarity and value of the library — if the other 
rooms should turn out as rich as that one.” 

“I believe old books are expensive nowadays,” she re- 
turned. “ They are more sought after, I understand.” 

We resumed our work with fresh vigor, and got on faster. 
Both Clara and Mary were assiduous in their help. 

To go back for a little to my own old chest — ^we found it, 
as I have said, full of musty papers. After turning over a 
few, seeming, to my uneducated eye, deeds and wills and such 
like, out of which it was evident I could gather no barest 
meaning without a labor I was not inclined to expend on 
them, — for I had no pleasure in such details as involved 
nothing of the picturesque, — I threw the one in my hand 
upon the heap already taken from the box, and to the indigna- 
tion of Charley, who was absorbed in one of them, and had 
not spoken a word for at least a quarter of an hour, ex- 
claimed — 

“ Come, Charley ; I’m sick of the rubbish. Let’s go and 
have a walk before supper.” 

“ Rubbish !” he repeated ; “ I am ashamed of you !” 

“I see Clara has been setting you on. I wonder what she’s 
got in her head. I am sure I have quite a sufficient regard 
for family history and all that.” 

“ Very like it!” said Charley — “calling such a chestM as 
this rubbish!” 

“ I am pleased enough to possess it,” I said; “ but if they 
had been such books as some of those at the Hall ” 

“ Look here then,” he said, stooping over the chest, and 
with some difficulty hauling out a great folio which he had 
discovered below, but had not yet examined — “just see what 
you can make of that.” 

I opened the title-page, rather eagerly. I stared. Could I 
believe my eyes ? First of all on the top of it, in the neatest 
old hand, was written — “ Guilfrid Combremead His Boke. 


THE OLD CHEST. 


309 


1630.” Then followed what I will not write, lest this MS. 
should by any accident fall into the hands of book-hunters 
before my death. I jumped to my feet, gave a shout that 
brought Charley to his feet also, and danced about the empty 
room hugging the folio. “ Have you lost your senses ?” said 
Charley ; but when he had a peep of the title-page, he became 
as much excited as myself, and it was some time before he 
could settle down to the papers again. Like a bee over a 
flower-bed, I went dipping and sipping at my treasure. Every 
word of the well-known lines bore a flavor of ancient verity 
such as I had never before perceived in them. At length I 
looked up, and finding him as much absorbed as I had been 
myself, 

“ Well, Charley, what are you finding there ?” I asked. 

“ Proof, perhaps, that you come of an older family than 
you think,” he answered ; “ proof certainly that some part at 
least of the Moldwarp property was at one time joined to the 
Moat, and that you are of the same stock a branch of which 
was afterwards raised to the present baronetage. At least I 
have little doubt such is the case, though I can hardly say I 
am yet prepared to prove it.” 

“You don’t mean I’m of the same blood as — as Geofl5-ey 
Brotherton !” I said. “ I would rather not, if it’s the same to 
you, Charley.” 

“ I can’t help it : that’s the way things point,” he answered, 
throwing down the parchment. “ But I can’t read more now. 
Let’s go and have a walk. I’ll stop at home to-morrow, and 
take a look over the whole set.” 

“ I’ll stop with you.” 

“ No, you won’t. You’ll go and get on with your library. 
I shall do better alone. If I could only get a peep at the 
Moldwarp chest as well I” 

“ B’’' the place may have been bought and sold many 
times. Just look here though,” I said, as I showed him the 
crest on my watch and seal. “ Mind you look at the top of 
your spoon the next time you eat soup at the Hall.” 

“ That is unnecessary, quite. I recognize the crest at once. 


310 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


How strangely these cryptographs come drifting along the 
tide, like the gilded ornaments of a wreck after the hull has 
gone down !” 

“ Or, like the mole or squint that reappears in successive 
generations, the legacy of some long-forgotten ancestor,” I 
said — and several things unexplained occurred to me as 
possibly having a common solution. 

“ I find, however,” said Charley, ‘‘ that the name of Cum- 
bermede is not mentioned in your papers more than about a 
hundred years back — as far as I have yet made out.” 

“ That is odd,” I returned, “ seeing that in the same chest 
we find that book with my name, surname and Christian, and 
the date 1630.” 

‘‘ It is strange,” he acquiesced, “ and will perhaps require a 
somewhat complicated theory to meet it.” 

We began to talk of other matters, and naturally enough, 
soon came to Clara. 

Charley was never ready to talk of her — ^indeed avoided 
the subject in a way that continued to perplex me. 

“ I confess to you, Charley,” I said, there is something 
about her I do not and cannot understand. It seems to me 
always as if she were — I will not say underhand, but as if she 
had some object in view — some design upon you — ” 

“ Upon me I” exclaimed Charley, looking at me suddenly 
and with a face jfrom which all the color had fled. 

‘‘No, no, Charley, not that,” I answered, laughing. “I 
used the word impersonally. I will be more cautious. One 
would think we had been talking about a witch — or a demon- 
lady — ^you are so frightened at the notion of her having you 
in her eye.” 

He did not seem altogether relieved, and I caught an 
uneasy glance seeking my countenance. 

“ But isn’t she charming ?” I went on. “ It is only to you 
I could talk about her so. And after all it may be only a 
fancy.” 

He kept his face downward and aside, as if he were ponder- 
ing and coming to no conclusion. The silence grew and grew 


THE OLD CHEST. 311 

until expectation ceased, and when I spoke again, it was of 
something difTerent. 

My reader may be certain from all this that I was not in 
love with Clara. Her beauty and liveliness, with a gayety 
which not seldom assumed the form of grace, attracted me 
much, it is true ; but nothing interferes more with the growth 
of any passion than a spirit of questioning, and that once 
aroused, love begins to cease and pass into pain. Few, 
perhaps, could have arrived at the point of admiration I had 
reached without falling instantly therefrom into an abyss of 
absorbing passion ; but with me, inasmuch as I searched every 
feeling in the hope of finding in it the everlasting, there was 
in the present case a reiterated check, if not indeed recoil ; for 
I was not and could not make myself sure that Clara was 
upright; — ^perhaps the more commonplace word straightfor^ 
ward would express my meaning better. 

Anxious to get the books arranged before they all left me, 
for I knew I should have but little heart for it after they were 
gone, I grudged Charley the forenoon he wanted amongst my 
papers, and prevailed upon him to go with me next day as 
usual. Another fortnight, which was almost the limit of their 
stay, would, I thought, suffice ; and giving up everything else» 
Charley and I worked from morning till night, with much 
though desultory assistance from the ladies. I contrived to 
keep the carpenter and housemaid in work, and by the end of 
the week began to see the inroads of order ** scattering the 
rear of darkness thin.** 


812 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXXVIIL 

MARY OSBORNE. 

All this time the acquaintance between Mary Osborne and 
myself had not improved. Save as the sister of my friend I 
had not, I repeat, found her interesting. She did not seem at 
all to fulfill the promise of her childhood. Hardly once did 
she address me ; and, when I spoke to her, would reply with a 
simple, dull directness, which indicated nothing beyond the 
fact of the passing occasion. Rightly or wrongly, I con- 
cluded that the more indulgence she cherished for Charley, 
the less she felt for his friend — ^that to him she attributed the 
endlessly sad declension of her darling brother. Once on her 
face I surprised a look of unutterable sorrow resting on 
Charley’s ; but the moment she saw that 1 observed her, the 
look died out, and her face stifiened into its usual dullness and 
negation. On me she turned only the unenlightened disc of 
her soul. Mrs. Osbcame, whom I seldom saw, behaved with 
much more kindness, though hardly more cordiality. It was 
only that she allowed her bright indulgence for Charley to 
cast the shadow of his image over the faults of his friend ; 
and except by the sadness that dwelt in every line of her 
sweet face, she did not attract me. I was ever aware of an 
inward judgment which I did not believe I deserved, and I 
would turn from her look with a sense of injury which greater 
love would have changed into keen pain. 

Once, however, I did meet a look of sympathy from Mary. 
On the second Monday of the fortnight I was more anxious 
than ever to reach the end of my labors, and was in the court, 
accompanied by Charley, as early as eight o’clock. From the 
hall a dark passage led past the door of the dining-room to 
the garden. Through the dark tube of the passage, we saw 
the bright green of a lovely bit of sward, and upon it Mary 
^nd Clara radiant in white morning dresses. We joined them. 


MAKY OSBORNE. 


313 


" Here come the slave-drivers !” remarked Clara. 

“ Already said Mary, in a low voice, which I thought 
had a tinge of dismay in its tone. 

“ Never mind, Polly,” said her companion — “ we’re not 
going to bow to their will and pleasure. W e’ll have our walk 
in spite of them.” 

As she spoke she threw a glance at us which seemed to say 
— “You may come if you like;” then turned to Mary with 
another which said : “ We shall see whether they prefer old 
books or young ladies.” 

Charley looked at me — interrogatively. 

“ Do as you like, Charley,” I said. 

“ I will do as you do,” he answered. 

“ Well,” I said, “ I have no right ” 

“Oh, bother!” said Clara — “ You’re so magnificent always 
with your rights and wrongs I Are you coming, or are you 
not?” 

“ Yes, I’m coming,” I replied, convicted by Clara’s direct- 
ness, for I was quite ready to go. 

We crossed the court, and strolled through the park, which 
was of great extent, in the direction of a thick wood, covering 
a rise towards the east. The morning air was perfectly still ; 
there was a little dew on the grass, which shone rather than 
sparkled; the sun was burning through a light fog, which 
grew deeper as we approached the wood ; the decaying leaves 
filled the air with their sweet, mournful scent. Through the 
wood went a wide opening or glade, stretching straight and 
far towards the east, and along this we walked with that exhil- 
aration which the fading autumn so strangely bestows. For 
some distance the ground ascended softly, but the view was 
finally closed in by a more abrupt swell, over the brow of 
which the mist hung in dazzling brightness. 

Notwithstanding the gayety of animal spirits produced by 
the season, I felt unusually depressed that morning. Already, 
I believe, I was beginning to feel the home-born sadness of the 
soul whose wings are weary and whose foot can find no firm 
soil on which to rest. Sometimes I think the wonder is that 


314 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


SO many men are never sad. I doubt if Charley would have 
suffered so but for the wrongs his father’s selfish religion liad 
done him ; which perhaps were therefore so far well, inasmuch 
as otherwise he might not have cared enough about religion 
even to doubt concerning it But in my case now, it may have 
been only the unsatisfying presence of Clara, haunted by a 
dim regret that I could not love her more than I did. For 
with regard to her, my soul was like one who, in a dream 
of delight, sees outspread before him a wide river, wherein he 
makes haste to plunge that he may disport himself in the fine 
element ; but, wading eagerly, alas ! finds not a single pool 
deeper than his knees. 

“ What’s the matter with you, Wilfrid ?” said Charley, who, 
in the midst of some gay talk, suddenly perceived my silence. 
“You seem to lose all your spirits away from your precious 
library. I do believe you grudge every moment not spent 
upon those ragged old books.” 

“ I wasn’t thinking of that, Charley ; I was wondering what 
lies beyond that mist.” 

“ I see ! — A chapter of the Pilgrim's Progress / Here we 
are — Mary, you’re Christiana, and Clara, you’re Mercy. Wil- 
frid, you’re— what ? — I should have said Hopeful any other 
day, but this morning you look like — let me see — ^like Mr. 
Keady-to-Halt. The celestial city lies behind that fog — 
doesn’t it, Christiana ?” 

“ I don’t like to hear you talk so, Charley,” said his sister, 
smiling in his face. 

“ They ain’t in the Bible,” he returned. 

“ No — and I shouldn’t mind if you were only merry, but 
you know you are scoffing at the story, and I love it— so I 
can’t be pleased to hear you.” 

“I beg your pardon, Mary— but your celestial city lies 
behind such a fog, that not one crystal turret, one pearly gate 
of it was ever seen. At least we have never caught a glimmer 
of it ; and must go tramp, tramp— we don’t know whither, 
any more than the blind puppy that has crawled too fa.’ from 
his mother’s side.” 


MARY OSBORNE. 


315 


** I do see the light of it, Charley dear,’^ said Mary, sadly — 
not as if the light were any great comfort to her at the moment. 

“ If you do see something — how can you tell what it’s the 
light of? It may come from the city of Dis, for anything you 
know.” 

“ I don’t know what that is.” 

“Oh! the red-hot city — down below. You will find all 
about it in Dante.” 

“It doesn’t look like that — ^the light I see,” said Mary, 
quietly. 

“ How very ill-bred you are — to say such wicked things, 
Charley 1” said Clara. 

“Ami? They are better unmentioned. Let us eat and 
drink, for to-morrow we die I Only don’t allude to the un- 
pleasant subject.” 

He burst out singing ; the verses were poor, but I will give 
them. 

Let the sun shimmer ! 

Let the wind blow ! 

All is a notion — 

What do we know? 

Let the moon glimmer 1 
Let the stream flow I 
All is but motion 
To and fro ! 

Let the rose wither I 
Let the stars glow ! 

Let the rain batter — 

Drift sleet and snow ! 

Bring the tears hither I 
Let the smiles go ! 

What does it matter ? 

To and fro ! 

** To and fro ever, 

Motion and show I 
Nothing goes onward— > 

Hurry or no ! 

All is one river — 

Seaward, and so 
Up again sunward— 

To and fro ! 


816 


WILFEID CUMBERMEDB 


"Pendulum sweeping 
High, and now low ! 
That star — tic, blot it ! 

Tac, let it go ! 

Time he is reaping 
Hay for his mow j 
That flower — he’s got it I 
To and fro ! 

" Such a scythe swingings 
Mighty and slow ! 
Ripping and slaying — 
Hey nonny no ! 

Black Ribs is singing — 
Chorus — Hey, ho ! 
What is he saying — 

To and fro ? 

"Singing and saying 
* Grass is hay — ho I 
Love is a longing j 
Water is snow.' 
Swinging and swaying, 
Toll the bells go ! 
Dinging and donging 
To and fro." 


**Oh Charley!” said his sister, with suppressed agony, 
“ what a wicked song !” 

“ It is a wicked song,” I said. “ But I meant — it only rep- 
resents an unbelieving, hopeless mood.” 

“ You wrote it then 1” she said, giving me — as it seemed, 
involuntarily — a look of reproach. 

“Yes, I did; but ” 

“Then I think you are very horrid,” said Clara, inter- 
lupting. 

“ Charley!” I said, “you must not leave your sister to think 
so badly of me! You know why I wrote it — and what I 
meant.” 

“ I wish I had written it myself,” he returned. “ I think it 
splendid. Anybody might envy you that song.” 

“ But you know I didn’t mean it for a true one.” 


MARY OSBORNE. 


317 


“ Who knows whether it is true or false ?” 

“ Jknow,” said Mary : “ I know it is false.’* 

“And / hope it,” I adjoined. 

“ What ever put such horrid things in your head, Wilfrid ?’* 
asked Clara. 

“ Probably the fear lest they should be true. The verses 
came as I sat in a country church once, not long ago.” 

“ In a church I” exclaimed Mary. 

“Oh! he does go to church sometimes,” said Charley with a 
laugh. 

“How could you think of it in church?” persisted Mary. 

“ It’s more like the churchyard,” said Clara. 

“ It was in an old church in a certain desolate sea-forsaken 
town,” I said. “ The pendulum of the clock — a huge, long, 
heavy, slow thing, hangs far down into the church, and goes 
swing, swang over your head, three or four seconds to every 
swing. When you have heard the tie, your heart grows faint 
every time between — waiting for the tac^ which seems as if it 
would never come.” 

We were ascending the acclivity, and no one spoke again 
before we reached the top. There a wide landscape lay 
stretched before us. The mist was rapidly melting away 
before the gathering strength of the sun : as we stood and gazed 
we could see it vanishing. By slow degrees the colors of the au- 
tumn woods dawned out of it. Close under us lay a great 
wave of gorgeous red — ^beeches I think — in the midst of which, 
here and there, stood up, tall and straight and dark, the un- 
changing green of a fir-tree. The glow of a hectic death was 
over the landscape, melting away into the misty fringe of the 
far horizon. Overhead the sky was blue with a clear thin 
blue that told of withdrawing suns and coming frosts. 

“ For my part,” I said, “ I cannot believe that beyond this 
loveliness there lies no greater. Who knows, Charley, but 
death may be the first recognizable step of the progress of 
which you despair ?” 

It was then I caught the look from Mary’s eye, for the sake 
of which I have recorded the little incidents of the morning. 


318 


WILFEID CUMBEBMEDE. 


But the same moment the look faded, and the veil or the mask 
fell over her face. 

“ I am afraid,” she said, “ If there has been no progress be- 
fore, there will be little indeed after.” 

Now of all things, I hated the dogmatic theology of the 
party in which she had been brought up, and I turned from 
her with silent dislike. 

“ Really,” said Clara, “ you gentlemen have been very en- 
tertaining this morning. One would think Polly and I had 
come out for a stroll with a couple of undertaker’s-men. 
There’s surely time enough to think of such things yet I None 
of us are at death’s door exactly.” 

“ * Sweet Remembrancer !’ — Who knows ?” said Charley. 

* Now I, to comfort him,’ ” I followed, quoting Mrs. 
Quickly concerning Sir John Falstaff, “ ‘ bid him, ’a should 
not think of God ; I hoped there was no need to trouble him- 
self with any such thoughts yet.’ ” 

“ I beg your pardon,” said Mary — ** there was no word of 
Him in the matter.” 

“ I see,” said Clara : “ you meant that at me, Wilfrid. But 
I assure you I am no heathen. I go to church regularly — 
once a Sunday when I can, and twice when I can’t help it. 
That’s more than you do, Mr. Cumbermede, I suspect.” 

“ What makes you think so ?” I asked. 

“ I can’t imagine you enjoying anything but the burial ser- 
vice.” 

“ It is to my mind the most consoling of them all,” I answered. 

“ Well, I haven’t reached the point of wanting that conso- 
lation yet, thank heaven.” 

“Perhaps some of us would rather have the consolation 
than give thanks that we didn’t need it,” I said. 

“ I can’t understand you, but I know you mean something 
disagreeable. Polly, I think we had better go home to break- 
fast.” 

Mary turned, and we all followed. Little was said on the 
way home. We divided in the hall — ^the ladies to breakfast, 
and we to our work. 


MARY OSBORNE. 319 

We had not spoken for an hour, when Charley broke the 
silence. 

“ What a brute I am, Wilfrid !” he said. ** Why shouldn’t 
I be as good as Jesus Christ ? It seems always as if a man 
might. But just look at me! Because I was miserable 
myself, I went and made my poor little sister twice as misera- 
ble as she was before. She’ll never get over what I said this 
morning.” 

“ It was foolish of you, Charley.” 

“ It was brutal. I am the most selfish creature in the world 
— always taken up with myself. I do believe there is a devil, 
after all. I am a devil. And the universal self is the devil. 
If there were such a thing as a self always giving itself away 
— that self would be God.” 

“ Something very like the God of Christianity, I think.” 

“If it were so, there would be a chance for us. We might 
then one day give the finishing blow to the devil in us. But 
no : he does all for his own glory.” 

“ It depends on what his glory is. If what the self-seeking 
self would call glory, then I agree with you — that is not the 
God we need. But if his glory should be just the opposite — 

the perfect giving of himself away — then . Of course I 

know nothing about it. My uncle used to say things like that.” 

He did not reply, and we went on with our work. Neither 
of the ladies came near us again that day. 

Before the end of the week, the library was in tolerable 
order to the eye, though it could not be perfectly arranged 
until the commencement of a catalogue should be as the dawn 
of a consciousness in the half-restored mass. 


320 


WrLFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 

A STORM. 

So many books of rarity and value had revealed themselves 
that it was not difficult to make Sir Giles comprehend in some 
degree the importance of such a possession ; he had grown 
more and more interested as the work went on : and even 
Lady Brotherton, although she much desired to have at least 
the oldest and most valuable of the books re-bound in red 
morocco first, was so far satisfied with what she was told con- 
cerning the worth of the library, that she determined to invite 
some of the neighbors to dinner, for the sake of showing it. 
The main access to it was to be by the armory ; and she had 
that side of the gallery round the hall which led thither, 
covered with a thick carpet. 

Meanwhile Charley had looked over all the papers in my 
chest, but, beyond what I have already stated, no fact of spe- 
cial interest had been brought to light. 

In sending an invitation to Charley, Lady Brotherton could 
hardly avoid sending me one as well: I doubt whether I 
should otherwise have been allowed to enjoy the admiration 
bestowed on the result of my labors. 

The dinner was formal and dreary enough : the geniality of 
one of the heads of a household is seldom sufficient to give 
character to an entertainment. 

“ They tell me you are a buyer of books, Mr. Alderforge,” 
said Mr. Mollet to the clergyman of a neighboring parish, as 
we sat over our wine. 

“ Quite a mistake,” returned Mr. Alderforge. “ I am a 
reader of books.” 

“ That of course ! But you buy them first — don’t you?” 

Not always. I sometimes borrow them.” 


A STORM. 


321 


“That I never do. If a book is worth borrowing, it is 
worth buying.” 

“Perhaps — if you can afford it. But many books that 
book-buyers value, I count worthless — for all their wide 
margins and uncut leaves.” 

“Will you come and have a look at Sir Giles’s library?” 
I ventured to say. 

“I never heard of a library at Moldwarp Hall, Sir 
Giles,” said Mr. Mollet. 

“ I am given to understand there is a very valuable one,” 
said Mr. Alderforge. “ I shall be glad to accompany you, 
sir,” he added, turning to me, — “ if Sir Giles will allow us.” 

“You cannot have a better guide than Mr. Cumbermede,” 
said Sir Giles. “ I am indebted to him almost for the dis- 
covery — altogether for the restoration of the library.” 

“ Assisted by Miss Brotherton and her friends. Sir Giles,” 
I said. 

“A son of Mr. Cumbermede of Lowdon Farm, I pre- 
sume ?” said Mr. Alderforge, bowing interrogatively. 

“ A nephew,” I answered. 

“ He was a most worthy man. — By the way. Sir Giles, your 
young friend here must be a distant connection of your own. 
I found in some book or other lately, I forget where at the 
moment, that there were Cumbermedes at one time in Mold- 
warp Hall.” 

“ Yes — about two hundred years ago, I believe. It passed 
to our branch of the family some time during the troubles of 
the seventeenth century — I hardly know how — I am not 
much of an historian.” 

I thought of my precious volume, and the name on the 
title-page. That book might have once been in the library of 
Moldwarp Hall. If so, how had it strayed into my possession 
— alone, yet more to me than all that was left behind ? 

We betook ourselves to the library. The visitors expressed 
themselves astonished at its extent, and the wealth which even 
a glance revealed — for I took care to guide their notice to 
its richest veins. 

21 


322 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ When it is once arranged,” I said, “ I fancy there will be 
few private libraries to stand a comparison with it — I am 
thinking of old English literature, and old editions : there is 
not a single volume of the present century in it, so far as I 
know.” 

I had had a few old sconces fixed here and there, but as yet 
there were no means of really lighting the rooms. Hence, 
when a great flash of lightning broke from a cloud that hung 
over the park right in front of the windows, it flooded them 
with a dazzling splendor. I went to find Charley, for the 
library was the best place to see the lightning from. As I 
entered the drawing-room, a tremendous peal of thunder burst 
over the house, causing so much consternation amongst the 
ladies, that, for the sake of company, they all followed to the 
library. Clara seemed more frightened than any. Mary was 
perfectly calm. Charley was much excited. The storm grew 
in violence. We saw the lightning strike a tree which stood 
alone a few hundred yards from the house. When the next 
flash came, half of one side seemed torn away. The wind 
rose, first in fierce gusts, then into a tempest, and the rain 
poured in torrents. 

“ None of you can go home to-night, ladies,” said Sir Giles. 
“You must make up your minds to stay where you are. Few 
horses would face such a storm as that.” 

“ It would be to tax your hospitality too grievously. Sir 
Giles,” said Mr. Alderforge. “ I dare say it will clear up by 
and by, or at least moderate sufficiently to let us get home.” 

“ I don’t think there’s much chance of that,” returned Sir 
Giles. “ The barometer has been steadily falling for the last 
three days. My dear, you had better give your orders at 
once.” 

“ You had better stop, Charley,” I said. 

“ I won’t if you go,” he returned. 

Clara was beside. 

“ You must not think of going,” she said. 

Whether she spoke to him or me, I did not know, but as 
Charley made no answer — 


A STOEM. 


323 


I cannot stop without being asked,” I said, “ and it is not 
likely any one will take the trouble to ask me.” 

The storm increased. At the request of the ladies, the gen- 
tlemen left the library and accompanied them to the drawing- 
room for tea. Our hostess asked Clara to sing, but she 
was too frightened to comply. 

“You will sing, Mary, if Lady Brotherton asks you, I 
know,” said Mrs. Osborne. 

“ Do, my dear,” said Lady Brotherton ; and Mary at once 
complied. 

I had never heard her sing, and did not expect much. But 
although she had little execution, there was, I found, a wonder- 
ful charm both in her voice and the simplicity of her mode. 
I did not feel this at first, nor could I tell when the song began 
to lay hold upon me ; but when it ceased, I found that I had 
been listening intently. I have often since tried to recall it, 
but as yet it has eluded all my efibrts. I still cherish the hope 
that it may return some night in a dream, or in some waking 
moment of quiescent thought, when what we call the brain 
works as it were of itself, and the spirit allows it play. 

The close was lost in a louder peal of thunder than had yet 
burst. Charley and I went again to the library to look out on 
the night. It was dark as pitch, except when the lightning 
broke and revealed everything for one intense moment. 

“ I think sometimes,” said Charley, “ that death will be like 
one of those fiashes, revealing everything in hideous fact — ^for 
just one moment and no more.” 

“ How for one moment and no more, Charley ?” I asked. 

“ Because the sight of the truth concerning itself must kill 
the soul, if there be one, with disgust at its own vileness, and 
the miserable contrast between its aspirations and attainments, 
its pretences and its efibrts. At least, that would be the death 
fit for a life like mine — a death of disgust at itself. We claim 
immortality ; we cringe and cower with the fear that immor- 
tality may not be the destiny of man ; and yet we — I — do 
things unworthy not merely of immortality, but unworthy of 
the butterfly existence of a single day in such a world as this 


324 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


sometimes seems to be. Just think how I stabbed at my sister’s 
faith this morning — careless of making her as miserable as 
myself I Because my father has put into her mind his fancies, 
and I hate them, I would wound again the heart which they 
wound, and which cannot help their presence I” 

“ But the heart that can be sorry for an action is far above 
the action, just as her heart is better than the notions that 
haunt it.” 

“ Sometimes I hope so. But action determines character. 
And it is all such a muddle ! I don’t care much about what 
they call immortality. I doubt if it is worth the having. I 
would a thousand times rather have one day of conscious purity 
of heart and mind, and soul and body, than an eternity of such 

life as I have now. What am I saying ?” he added, with a 

despairing laugh. “ It is a fool’s comparison ; for an eternity 
of the former would be bliss — one moment of the latter is 
misery.” 

I could but admire and pity my poor friend both at once. 

Miss Pease had entered unheard. 

“Mr. Cumbermede,” she said, “I have been looking for you 
to show you your room. It is not the one I should like to have 
got for you, but Mrs. Wilson says you have occupied it before, 
and I dare say you will find it comfortable enough.” 

“ Thank you, Miss Pease. I am sorry you should have taken 
the trouble. I can go home well enough. I am not afraid of 
a little rain.” 

“ A little rain !” said Charley, trying to speak lightly. 

“Well, any amount of rain,” I said. 

“ But the lightning !” — expostulated Miss Pease, in a timid 
voice. 

“ I am something of a fatalist. Miss Pease,” I said. “ ‘ Every 
bullet has its billet,’ you know. Besides, if I had a choice, I 
think I would rather die by lightning than any other way.” 

“ Don’t talk like that, Mr. Cumbermede — Oh ! what a flash !” 

“ I was not speaking irreverently, I assure you,” I replied. — 
“ I think I had better set out at once, for there seems no chance 
of its clearing.” 


A STORM. 


325 


“ I am sure Sir Giles would be distressed if yon did.” 

“ He will never know, and I dislike giving trouble.” 

“ The room is ready. I will show you where it is, that you 
may go when you like.” 

“ If Mrs. Wilson says it is a room I have occupied before, I 
know the way quite well.” 

“ There are two ways to it,” she said. “ But of course one 
of them is enough,” she added with a smile. “ Mr. Osborne, 
your room is in another part quite.” 

“ I know where my sister’s room is,” said Charley. “ Is it 
anywhere near hers ?” 

“ That is the room you are to have. Miss Osborne is to be 
with your mamma, I think. There is plenty of accommoda- 
tion, only the notice was short.” 

I began to button my coat. 

“Don’t go, Wilfrid,’’ said Charley. “You might give 
offence. Besides, you will have the advantage of getting to 
work as early as you please in the morning.” 

It was late, and I was tired — consequently less inclined than 
usual to encounter a storm, for in general I enjoyed being in 
any commotion of the elements. Also, I felt I should like to 
pass another night in that room, and have besides the opportu- 
nity of once more examining at my leisure the gap in the 
tapestry. 

“ Will you meet me early in the library, Charley ?” I said. 

“ Yes— to be sure I will — as early as you like.” 

“ Let us go to the drawing-room then.” 

“ Why should you, if you are tired and want to go to bed ?” 

“ Because Lady Brotherton will not like my being included 
in the invitation. She will think it absurd of me not to go 
home.” 

“There is no occasion to go near her, then.” 

“ I do not choose to sleep in the house without knowing that 
she knows it.” 

We went. I made my way to Lady Brotherton. Clara was 
standing near her. 

“ I am much obliged by your hospitality. Lady Brotherton,” 


326 WILFRID CUMBEEMEDE. 

I said. It is rather a rough night to encounter in evening 
dress.” 

She bowed. 

“The distance is not great, however,” I said, “and per- 
haps ” 

“ Out of the question I” said Sir Giles, who came up at the 
moment. 

“ Will you see then. Sir Giles, that a room is prepared for 
your guest ?” she said. 

“ I trust that is unnecessary,” he replied. “ I gave orders.” 
— But as he spoke he went towards the bell. 

“It is all arranged, I believe. Sir Giles,” I said. “Mrs. 
Wilson has already informed me which is my room. Good- 
night, Sir Giles.” 

He shook hands with me kindly. I bowed to Lady Brother- 
ton, and retired. 

It may seem foolish to record such mere froth of conversa- 
tion, but I want my reader to understand how a part at least 
of the family of Moldwarp Hall regarded me. 


A DREAM. 


327 


CHAPTER XL. 

A DREAM. 

My room looked dreary enough. There was no fire, and the 
loss of the patch of tapestry from the wall gave the whole an 
air of dilapidation. The wind howled fearfully in the chimney 
and about the door on the roof, and the rain came down on the 
leads like the distant trampling of many horses. But I was 
not in an imaginative mood. Charley was again my trouble. 
I could not bear him to be so miserable. Why was I not as 
miserable as he, I asked myself. Perhaps I ought to be, for 
although certainly I hoped more, I could not say I believed 
more than he. I wished more than ever that I did believe, for 
then I should be able to help him — I was sure of that ; but I 
saw no possible way of arriving at belief. Where was the 
proof? Where even the hope of a growing probability? 

With these thoughts drifting about in my brain, like waife 
which the tide will not let go, I was poring over the mutilated 
forms of the tapestry round the denuded door, with an expecta- 
tion, almost a conviction, that I should find the fragment stdl 
hanging on the wall of the kitchen at the Moat, the very piece 
wanted to complete the broken figures. When I had them 
well fixed in my memory I went to bed, and lay pondering 
over the several broken links which indicated some former con- 
nection between the Moat and the Hall, until I fell asleep, and 
began to dream strange wild dreams, of which the following 
was the last. 

I was in a great palace, wandering hither and thither, and 
meeting no one. A weight of silence brooded in the place. 
From hall to hall I went, along corridor and gallery, and up 
and down endless stairs. I knew that in some room near me 
was one whose name was Athanasia, — a maiden, I thought in 
my dream, whom I had known and loved for years, but had 


828 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


lately lost— I knew not how. Somewhere here she was, if only 
I could find her ! From room to room I went seeking her. 
Every room I entered bore some proof that she had just been 
there— but there she was not. In one lay a veil, in another a 
handkerchief, in a third a glove ; and all were scented with a 
strange entrancing odor, which I had never known before, but 
which in certain moods I can to this day imperfectly recall. I 
followed and followed until hope failed me utterly, and I sat 
down and wept. But while I wept, hope dawned afresh, and I 
rose and again followed the quest, until I found myself in a 
little chapel like that of Moldwarp Hall. It was filled with 
the sound of an organ, distance-faint, and the thin music was 
the same as the odor of the handkerchief which I carried in 
my bosom. I tried to follow the sound, but the chapel grew 
and grew as I wandered, and I came no nearer to its source. 
At last the altar rose before ine on my left, and through the 
bowed end of the aisle I passed behind it into the lady-chapel. 
There, against the outer wall stood a dusky, ill-defined shape. 
Its head rose above the sill of the eastern window, and I saw 
it against the rising moon. But that and the whole figure was 
covered with a thick drapery ; I could see nothing of the face, 
and distinguish little of the form. 

“ What art thou ?” I asked, trembling. 

I am death — dost thou not know me ?” answered the figure 
in a sweet, though worn and weary voice. “ Thou hast been 
following me all thy life, and hast followed me hither.” 

Then I saw through the lower folds of the cloudy garment, 
which grew thin and gauze-like as I gazed, a huge iron door, 
with folding leaves, and a great iron bar across them. 

“ Art thou at thy own door ?” I asked. “ Surely thy house 
cannot open under the eastern window of the church ?” 

“ Follow and see,” answered the figure. 

Turning, it drew back the bolt, threw wide the portals, and 
low-stooping entered. I followed, not into the moonlit night, 
but through a cavernous opening into darkness. If mv Atha- 
nasia were down with Death, I would go with Death, that I 
might at least end with her. Down and down I followed the 


A DREAM 


329 


veiled figure, down flight after flight of stony stairs, through 
passages like those of the catacombs, and again down steep 
straight stairs. At length it stopped at another gate, and with 
beating heart I heard what I took for bony fingers fumbling 
with a chain and a bolt. But ere the fastenings had yielded, 
once more I heard the sweet odor-like music of the distant 
organ. The same moment the door opened, but I could see 
nothing for some time for the mighty inburst of a lovely light. 
A fair river, brimming full, its little waves flashing in the sun 
and wind, washed the threshold of the door, and over its sur- 
face, hither and thither, sped the white sails of shining boats, 
while from somewhere, clear now, but still afar, came the 
sound of a great organ psalm. Beyond the river the sun was 
rising — over blue summer hills that melted into blue summer 
sky. On the threshold stood my guide, bending towards me, 
as if waiting for me to pass out also. I lifted my eyes: the 
veil had fallen — it was my lost Athanasia ! Not one beam 
touched her face, for her back was to the sun, yet, her face 
was radiant Trembling, I would have kneeled at her feet, 
but she stepped out upon the flowing river, and with the 
sweetest of sad smiles, drew the door to, and left me alone in 
the dark hollow of the earth. I broke into a convulsive weep- 
ing, and awoke. 


330 


WILFEID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XLI. 

A WAKING. 

1 SUPPOSE I awoke tossing in my misery, for my hand fell 
upon something cold. I started up and tried to see. The 
light of a clear morning of late autumn had stolen into the 
room while I slept, and glimmered on something that lay 
upon the bed. It was some time before I could believe that 
my troubled eyes were not the sport of one of those odd illu- 
sions that come of mingled sleep and waking. But by the 
golden hilt and rusted blade I was at length convinced, 
although the scabbard was gone, that I saw my own sword. 
It lay by my left side, with the hilt towards my hand. But 
the moment I turned a little to take it in my right baud, I 
forgot all about it in a far more bewildering discovery, which 
fixed me staring half in terror, half in amazement, so that 
again for a moment I disbelieved in my waking condition. 
On the other pillow lay the face of a lovely girl. I felt as if 
I had seen it before — whether only in the just vanished dream, 
I could not tell. But the maiden of my dream never comes 
back to me with any other features or with any other expres- 
sion than those which I now beheld. There was an inefiable 
mingling of love and sorrow on the sweet countenance. The 
girl was dead asleep, but evidently dreaming, for tears were 
fiowing from under her closed lids. For a time I was unable 
even to think ; when thought returned, I was afraid to- move. 
All at once the face of Mary Osborne dawned out of the 
vision before me — ^how different, how glorified from its waking 
condition ! It was perfectly lovely — transfigured by the un- 
checked outflow of feeling. The recognition brought me to 
my senses at once. I did not waste a single thought in specu- 
lating how the mistake had occurred, for there was not a mo- 
ment to be lost. I must be wise to shield her, and chiefly, 


A WAKING. 


331 


as much as might be, from the miserable confusion which 
her own discovery of the untoward fact would occasion 
her. At first I thought it would be best to lie perfectly 
still, in order that she, at length awaking and discovering 
where she was, but finding me fast asleep, might escape 
with the conviction that the whole occurrence remained 
her own secret. I made the attempt, but I need hardly 
say that never before or since have I found myself in a 
situation half so perplexing; and in a few moments I was 
seized with such a trembling that I was compelled to turn my 
thoughts to the only other possible plan. As I reflected, the 
absolute necessity of attempting it became more and more ap- 
parent. In the first place, when she woke and saw me, she 
might scream and be heard ; in the next, she might be seen 
as she left the room, or, unable to find her way, might be 
involved in great consequent embarrassment. But, if I could 
gather all my belongings, and, without awaking her, escape 
by the stair to the roof, she would be left to suppose that she 
had but mistaken her chamber, and would, I hoped, remain in 
ignorance that she had not passed the night in it alone. I 
dared one more peep into her face. The light and the loveli- 
ness of her dream had passed ; I should not now have had to 
look twice to know that it was Mary Osborne ; but never more 
could I see in hers a common face. She was still fast asleep, 
and, stealthy as a beast of prey, I began to make my escape. 
At the first movement, however, my perplexity was redoubled, 
for again my hand fell on the sword which I had forgotten, 
and question after question as to how they were together, and 
together there, darted through my bewildered brain. Could 
a third person have come and laid the sword between us ? I 
had no time, however, to answer one of my own questions. 
Hardly knowing which was better, or if there was a better , I 
concluded to take the weapon with me, moved in part by the 
fact that I had found it where I had lost it, but influenced far 
more by its association with this night of marvel. 

Having gathered my garments together, and twice glanced 
around me — once to see that I left nothing behind, and once 


332 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


to take farewell of the peaceful face, which had never moved — 
I opened the little door in the wall, and made my strange 
retreat up the stair. My heart was beating so violently from 
the fear of her waking, that when the door was drawn to 
behind me, I had to stand for what seemed minutes before 1 
was able to ascend the steep stair, and step from its darkness 
into the clear frosty shine of the autumn sun, brilliant upon 
the leads wet with the torrents of the preceding night. 

I found a sheltered spot by the chimney-stack, where no one 
could see me from below, and proceeded to dress myself— 
assisted in my very imperfect toilet by the welcome discovery 
of a pool of rain in a depression of the lead-covered roof. 
But alas, before I had finished, I found that I had brought 
only one of my shoes away with me I This settled the ques- 
tion I was at the moment debating — whether, namely, it would 
be better to go home, or to find some way of reaching the 
library. I put my remaining shoe in my pocket, and set out 
to discover a descent. It would have been easy to get down 
into the little gallery, but it communicated on both sides im- 
mediately with bed-rooms, which for anything I knew might 
be occupied ; and besides, I was unwilling to enter the house 
for fear of encountering some of the domestics. But I knew 
more of the place now, and had often speculated concerning 
the odd position and construction of an outside stair in the 
first court, close to the chapel, with its landing at the door of 
a room en suite with those of Sir Giles and Lady Brotherton. 
It was for a man an easy drop to this landing : quiet as a 
cat, I crept over the roof, let myself down, crossed the court 
swiftly, drew back the bolt which alone secured the wicket, 
and, with no greater mishap than the unavoidable wetting of 
shoeless feet, was soon safe in my own room, exchanging my 
evening for a morning dress. When I looked at my watch, 
I found it nearly seven o’clock. 

I was so excited and bewildered by the adventures I had 
gone through, that, from very commonness, all the things 
about me looked alien and strange. I had no feeling of rela- 
tion to the world of ordinary life. The first thing I did was 


A WAKING. 


333 


to hang my sword in its own old place, and the next to take 
down the bit of tapestry from the opposite wall, which I pro- 
ceeded to examine in the light of my recollection of that round 
the denuded door. Room was left for not even a single doubt 
as to the relation between this and that: they had been 
wrought in one and the same piece by fair fingers of some 
long-vanished time. 


334 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XLIL 

A FALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 

In the same excited mood, but repressing it with all the 
energy I could gather, I returned to the Hall, and made my 
way to the library. There Charley soon joined me. 

“ Why didn’t you come to breakfast ?” he asked. 

** I’ve been home and changed my clothes,” I answered. “ I 
couldn’t well appear in a tail-coat. It’s bad enough to have 
to wear such an ugly thing by candle-light.” . 

“ What’s the matter with you ?” he asked again, after an 
interval of silence, which I judge from the question must have 
been rather a long one. 

“ What is the matter with me, Charley ?” 

“ I can’t tell. You don’t seem yourself, somehow.” 

I do not know what answer I gave him, but I knew myself 
what was the matter with me well enough. The form and 
face of the maiden of my dream, the Athanasia lost that she 
might be found, blending with the face and form of Mary 
Osborne, filled my imagination so that I could think of nothing 
else. Gladly would I have been rid of even Charley’s com- 
pany, that while my hands were busy with the books, my 
heart might brood at will now upon the lovely dream, now 
upon the lovely vision to which I awoke from it, and which, 
had it not glided into the forms of the foregone dream and 
possessed it with itself, would have banished it altogether. At 
length I was aware of light steps and sweet voices in the next 
room, and Mary and Clara presently entered. 

How came it that the face of the one had lost the half of 
its radiance, and the face of the other had gathered all that 
the fonner had lost? Mary’s countenance was as still as 
ever ; there was not in it a single ray of light beyond its usual 
expression; but I had become more capable of reading it, 


A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 


335 


for the coalescence of the face of my dream with her dreaming 
face had given me its key ; and I was now so far from in- 
different, that I was afraid to look for fear of betraying the 
attraction I now found it exercise over me. Seldom, surely, has 
a man been so long familiar with and careless of any counte- 
nance to find it all at once an object of absorbing interest ! 
The very fact of its want of revelation added immensely to its 
power over me now — ^for was I not in its secret ? Did I not 
know what a lovely soul hid behind that unexpressive coun- 
tenance? Did I not know that it was as the veil of the Holy of 
Holies, at times reflecting only the light of the seven golden 
lamps in the holy place ; at others almost melted away in the 
rush of the radiance unspeakable from the hidden and holier 
side— the region whence come the revelations? To draw 
through it if but once the feeblest glimmer of the light I had 
but once beheld, seemed an ambition worthy of a life. Know- 
ing her power of reticence, however, and of withdrawing from 
the outer courts into the penetralia of her sanctuary, guessing 
also at something of the aspect in which she regarded me, I 
dared not make any such attempt. But I resolved to seize 
what opportunity might offer of convincing her that I was not 
so far out of sympathy with her as to be unworthy of holding 
closer converse ; and I now began to feel distressed at what had 
given me little trouble before, namely, that she should suppose 
me the misleader of her brother, while I knew that, however 
far I might be from an absolute belief in things which she 
seemed never to have doubted, I was yet in some measure the 
means of keeping him from flinging aside the last cords which 
held him to the faith of his fathers. But I would not lead in 
any such direction, partly from the fear of hypocrisy, partly 
from horror at the idea of making capital of what little faith 
I had. But Charley himself afforded me an opportunity 
which I could not, whatever my scrupulosity, well avoid. 

“ Have you ever looked into that little book, Charley ?” I 
said, finding in my hands an early edition of the Christian 
Morals of Sir Thomas Browne— I wanted to say something, 
that I might not appear distraught. 


336 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“No/’ he answered, with indifference, as he glanced at the 
title page. “ Is it anything particular ?” 

“ Everything he writes, however whimsical in parts, is well 
worth more than mere reading,” I answered. “ It is a strangely 
latinized style, but has its charm notwithstanding.” 

He was turning over the leaves as I spoke. Receiving no 
response, I looked up. He seemed to have come upon some- 
thing which had attracted him. 

“ What have you found ?” I asked. 

“ Here’s a chapter on the easiest way of putting a stop to it 
all,” he answered. 

“ What do you mean ?” 

“ He was a medical man — ^wasn’t he ? I’m ashamed to say 
I know nothing about him.” 

“ Yes, certainly he was.” 

“ Then he knew what he was about.” 

“ As well probably as any man of his profession at the 
time.” 

“ He recommends drowning,” said Charley, without raising 
his eyes from the book. 

“ What do you mean ?” 

“ I mean for suicide.” 

“ Nonsense. He was the last man to favor that. You must 
make a mistake. He was a thoroughly Christian man.” 

“ I know nothing about that. Hear this.” 

He read the following passages from the beginning of the 
thirteenth section of the second part : — 

“ With what shift and pains we come into the world, we 
remember not ; but ’tis commonly found no easy matter to get 
out of it. Many have studied to exasperate the ways of death, 
but fewer hours have been spent to soften that necessity,” — 
“ Ovid, the old heroes, and the Stoics, who were so afraid of 
drowning, as dreading thereby the extinction of their soul, 
which they conceived to be a fire, stood probably in fear of an 
easier way of death ; wherein the water, entering the posses- 
aions of air, makes a temporary suffocation, and kills as it 
were without a fever. Surely many, who have had the spirit 


A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 


337 


to destroy themselves, have not been ingenious in the contri- 
vance thereof.” — “Cato is much to be pitied, who mangled 
himself with poniards ; and Hannibal seems more subtle, who 
carried his delivery, not in the point but the pommel of his 
sword.” 

“ Poison, I suppose,” he said, as he ended the extract. 

“ Yes, that’s the story, if you remember,” I answered ; “ but 
I don’t see that Sir Thomas is favoring suicide. Not at all. 
What he writes there is merely a speculation on the compara- 
tive ease of different modes of dying. L/et me see it.” 

I took the book from his hands, and, glancing over the 
essay, read the closing passage. 

“ But to learn to die, is better than to study the ways of 
dying. Death will find some ways to untie or cut the most 
gordian knots of life, and make men’s miseries as mortal as 
themselves : whereas evil spirits, as undying substances, are 
inseparable from their calamities ; and, therefore, they ever- 
lastingly struggle under their angustias, and bound up with 
immortality can never get out of themselves.” 

“ There ! I told you so !” cried Charley. “ Don’t you see ? 
He is the most cunning arguer — beats Despair, in the Fairy 
Queen, hollow !” 

By this time, either attracted by the stately flow of Sir 
Thomas’s speech, or by the tone of our disputation, the two 
girls had drawn nearer, and were listening. 

“ What do you mean, Charley ?” I said, perceiving however 
the hold I had by my further quotation given him. 

“First of all, he tells you the easiest way of djing, and 
then informs you that it ends all your troubles. He is too 
cunning to say in so many words that there is no hereafter, 
but what else can he wish you to understand when he says 
that in dying we have the advantage over the evil spirits, who 
cannot by death get rid of their sufferings ? I will read this 
book,” he added, closing it, and putting it in his pocket. 

“ I wish you would,” I said ; “ for although I confess you 
are logically right in your conclusions, I know Sir Thomas 
did not mean anything of the sort. He was only misled by 
22 


338 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


his love of antithesis into a hasty and illogical remark. The 
whole tone of his book is against such a conclusion. Besides, 
I do not doubt he was thinking only of good people, for whom 
he believed all suffering over at their death.” 

But I don’t see, supposing he does believe in immortality, 
why you should be so anxious about his orthodoxy on the 
other point. Didn’t Dr. Donne, as good a man as any, I pre- 
sume, argue on the part of the suicide?” 

“I have not read Dr. Donne’s essay, but I suspect the 
obliquity of it has been much exaggerated.” 

“ Why should you ? I never saw any argument worth the 
name on the other side. We have plenty of expressions of 
horror — ^but those are not argument. Indeed, the mass of the 
vulgar are so afraid of dying, that, apparently in terror lest 
suicide should prove infectious, they treat in a brutal manner 
the remains of the man who has only had the courage to free 
himself from a burden too hard for him to bear. It is all 
selfishness — ^nothing else. They love their paltry selves so 
much, that they count it a greater sin to kill one’s self than 
to kill another man — which seems to me absolutely devilish. 
Therefore, the vox populi, whether it be the vox Dei or not, is 
not nonsense merely, but absolute wickedness. Why shouldn’t 
a man kill himself?” 

Clara was looking on rather than listening, and her interest 
seemed that of amusement only. Mary’s eyes were wide-fixed 
on the face of Charley, evidently tortured to find that to the 
other enormities of his unbelief was to be added the justification 
of suicide. His habit of arguing was doubtless well enough 
known to her to leave room for the mitigating possibility that 
he might be arguing only for argument’s sake, but what he 
said could not but be shocking to her upon any supposition. 

I was not ready with an answer. Clara was the first to 
speak. 

“ It’s a cowardly thing, anyhow,” she said. 

“ How do you make that out. Miss Clara T* asked Charley. 
** I’m aware it’s the general opinion, but I don’t see it myself.” 

“ It’s surely cowardly to run away in that fashion.” 


A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 


339 


“For my part,” returned Charley, “I feel that it requires 
more courage than I’ve got, and hence it comes, I suppose, 
that I admire any one who has the pluck.” 

“ What vulgar words you use, Mr. Charles !” said Clara. 

“ Besides,” he went on, heedless of her remark, “ a man 
may want to escape— not from his duties — he mayn’t know 
w^hat they are — but from his own weakness and shame.” 

“ But, Charley dear,” said Mary, with a great light in her 
eyes, and the rest of her face as still as a sunless pond, “ you 
don’t think of the sin of it. I know you are only talking^ 
but some things oughtn’t to be talked of lightly.” 

“ What makes it a sin ? It’s not mentioned in the Ten 
Commandments,” said Charley. 

“ Surely it’s against the will of God, Charley dear.” 

“ He hasn’t said anything about it, anyhow. And why 
should I have a thing forced upon me whether I will or no, 
and then be pulled up for throwing it away when I found it 
troublesome ?” 

“ Surely I don’t quite understand you, Charley.” 

“Well, if I must be more explicit — I was never asked 
whether I chose to be made or not. I never had the condi- 
tions laid before me. Here I am, and I can’t help myself — 
so far, I mean, as that here I am.” 

“ But life is a good thing,” said Mary, evidently struggling 
with an almost overpowering horror. 

“ I don’t know that. My impression is that if I had been 
asked ” 

“ But that couldn’t be, you know.” 

“ Then it wasn’t fair. But why couldn’t I be made for a 
moment or two, long enough to have the thing laid before me, 
and be asked whether I would accept it or not ? My impres- 
sion is that I would have said — ^No, thank you ; — that is, if it 
was fairly put.” 

I hastened to offer a remark, in the hope of softening the 
pain such flippancy must cause her. 

“ And my impression is, Charley,” I said, “ that if such 
had been possible ” 


840 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Of course,” he interrupted, “ the God you believe in could 
have made me for a minute or two. He can, I suppose, un- 
make me now when he likes.” 

“ Yes ; but could he have made you all at once capable of 
understanding his plans, and your own future ? Perhaps that 
is what he is doing now — making you, by all you are going 
through, capable of understanding them. Certainly the ques- 
tion could not have been put to you before you were able to 
comprehend it, and this may be the only way to make you 
able. Surely a being who could make you had a right to risk 
the chance, if I may be allowed such an expression, of your 
being satisfied in the end with what he saw to be good — so 
good indeed that, if we accept the New Testament story, he 
would have been willing to go through the same troubles 
himself for the same end.” 

“ No, no ; not the same troubles,” he objected. “ Accord- 
ing to the story to which you refer, Jesus Christ was free from 
all that alone makes life unendurable — the bad inside you, 
that will come outside whether you will or no.” 

“I admit your objection. As to the evil coming out, I 
suspect it is better it should come out, so long as it is there. 
But the end is not yet; and still I insist the probability is, 
that if you could know it all now, you would say with sub- 
mission, if not with hearty concurrence — ‘Thy will be done.’” 

“ I have known people who could say that without knowing 
it all now, Mr. Cumbermede,” said Mary. 

I had often called her by her Christian name, but she had 
never accepted the familiarity. 

“ No doubt,” said Charley ; “ but Tm not one of those.” 

“ If you would but give in,” said his sister, “ you would— i 
in the end, I mean — say, ‘ It is well.’ I am sure of that.” 

“ Yes — perhaps I might — after all the sufifering had been 
forced upon me, and was over at last — when I had been 
thoroughly exhausted and cowed, that is.” 

“ Which wouldn’t satisfy any thinking soul, Charley — much 
less God,” I said. “ But if there be a God at all ” 

Mary gave a slight inarticulate cry. 


A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 


341 


“ Dear Miss Osborne,” I said, “ I beg you will not misun- 
derstand me. I cannot be sure about it as you are — I wish I 
could — but I am not disputing it in the least; I am only 
trying to make my argument as strong as I can. I was going 
to say to Charley — not to you — that if there be a God, He 
would not have compelled us to be, except with the absolute 
foreknowledge that when we knew all about it, we would cer- 
tainly declare ourselves ready to go through it all again, if 
need should be, in order to attain the known end of His high 
calling.” 

“ But isn’t it very presumptuous to assert anything about 
God which He has not revealed in his word ?” said Mary, in a 
gentle, subdued voice, and looking at me with a sweet doubt- 
fulness in her eyes. 

I am only insisting on the perfection of God — as far as I 
can understand perfection,” I answered. 

“ But may not the perfection of God be something very dif- 
ferent from anything we can understand ?” 

“ I will go farther,” I returned. “ It must be something 
that we cannot understand — ^but different from what we can 
understand by being greater, not by being less.” 

“ Many’t it be such that we can’t understand it at all?” she 
insisted. 

“ Then how should we ever worship Him ? How should we 
ever rejoice in Him ? Surely it is because you see God to be 
good ” 

Or fancy you do,” interposed Charley. 

“ Or fancy you do,” I assented, “ that you love Him — not 
merely because you are told He is good. The Feejee islander 
might assert his God to be good, but would that make you 
love him ? If you heard that a great power, away somewhere, 
who had nothing to do with you at all, was very good, would 
that make you able to love him ?” 

“ Yes, it would,” said Mary, decidedly. “ It is only a good 
man who would see that God was good.” 

“ There you argue entirely on my side. It must be because 
you supposed his goodness what you called goodness — not 


342 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


something else — that you could love him on testimony. But 
even then, your love could not be of that mighty, absorbing 
kind which alone you would think fit between you and your 
God. It would not be loving him with all your heart and 
soul and strength and mind — would it ? It would be loving 
him second-hand — not because of himself, seen and known by 
yourself.” 

But Charley does not even love God second-hand,” she 
said, with a despairing mournfulness. 

“ Perhaps because he is very anxious to love Him first-hand, 
and what you tell him about God does not seem to him to 
be good. Surely neither man nor woman can love because of 
what seems not good ! I confess one may love in spite of what 
is bad, but it must be because of other things that are good.” 

She was silent. 

However goodness may change its forms,” I went on, “ it 
must still be goodness ; only if we are to adore it, we must see 
something of what it is — of itself. And the goodness we can- 
not see, the eternal goodness, high above us as the heavens are 
above the earth, must still be a goodness that includes, 
absorbs, elevates, purifies all our goodness, not tramples upon 
it and calls it wickedness. For if not such, then we have 
nothing in common with God, and what we call goodness is 
not of God. He has not even ordered it ; or, if He has. He 
has ordered it only to order the contrary afterwards ; and there 
is, in reality, no real goodness — at least in Him ; and if not in 
Him, of whom we spring — where then ? — and what becomes 
of ours, poor as it is ?” 

My reader will see that I had already thought much about 
these things; although, I suspect, I have now not only 
expressed them far better than I could have expressed them 
in conversation, but with a degree of clearness which must be 
owing to the further continuance of the habit of reflecting on 
these and cognate subjects. Deep in my mind, however, 
something like this lay ; and in some manner like this I tried 
to express it. 

Finding she continued silent, and that Charley did not 


A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 


343 


appear inclined to renew the contest, anxious also to leave no 
embarrassing silence to choke the channel now open between 
us — I mean Mary and myself— I returned to the original 
question. 

“ It seems to me, Charley — and it follows from all we have 
been saying — that the sin of suicide lies just in this, that it is 
an utter want of faith in God. I confess I do not see any 
other ground on which to condemn it — provided always, that 
the man has no others dependent upon him, none for whom 
he ought to live and work.” 

“ But does a man owe nothing to himself?” said Clara. 

“Nothing that I know of,” I replied. “I am under no 
obligation to myself. How can I divide myself, and say that 
the one-half of me is indebted to the other ? To my mind, 
it is a mere fiction of speech.” 

“ But whence then should such a fiction arise ?” objected 
Charley, willing, perhaps, to defend Clara. 

“ From the dim sense of a real obligation, I suspect, the 
object of which is mistaken. I suspect it really springs from 
our relation to the unknown God, so vaguely felt that a false 
form is readily accepted for its embodiment by a being who, 
in ignorance of its nature, is yet aware of its presence. I 
mean that what seems an obligation to self is in reality a 
dimly apprehended duty — an obligation to the unknown God, 
and not to self, in which lies no causing, therefore no obli- 
gating power.” 

“But why say the unknown God, Mr. Cumbermede?” asked 
Mary. 

“ Because I do not believe that any one who knew Him 
could possibly attribute to himself what belonged to Him — 
could, I mean, talk of an obligation to himself, when that 
obligation was to God.” 

How far Mary Osborne followed the argument or agreed 
with it I cannot tell ; but she gave me a look of something like 
gratitude, and my heart felt too big for its closed chamber. 

At this moment the housemaid, who had along with the 
carpenter assisted me in the library, entered the room. She 


344 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


was rather a forward girl, and I suppose presumed on our 
acquaintance to communicate directly with myself instead of 
going to the housekeeper. Seeing her approach as if she 
wanted to speak to me, I went to meet her. She handed me 
a small ring, sayiijg, in a low voice, 

“ I found this in your room, sir, and thought it better to 
bring it to you.” 

“ Thank you,” I said, putting it at once on my little finger ; 
** I am glad you found it.” 

Charley and Clara had begun talking. I believe Clara was 
trying to make Charley give her the book he had pocketed, 
imagining it really of the character he had, half in sport, pro- 
fessed to believe it. But Mary had caught sight of the ring, 
and, with a bewildered expression on her countenance, was 
making a step towards me. I put my finger to my lips, and 
gave her a look by which I succeeded in arresting her. 
Utterly perplexed, I believe, she turned away towards the 
bookshelves behind her. I went into the next room, and 
called Charley. 

“ I think we had better not go on with this talk,” I said. 
“You are very imprudent indeed, Charley, to be always 
bringing up subjects that tend to widen the gulf between 
you and your sister. When I have a chance, I do what I can 
to make her doubt whether you are so far wrong as they think 
you, but you must give her time. All your kind of thought 
is so new to her that your words cannot possibly convey to her 
what is in your mind. If only she were not so afraid of me I 
But I think she begins to trust me a little.” 

“ It^s no use,” he returned. “ Her head is so fuU of rub- 
bish!” 

“ But her heart is so full of goodness I” 

“ I wish you could make anything of her ! But she looks 
up to my father with such a blind adoration, that it isn’t of the 
slightest use attempting to put an atom of sense into her.” 

“ I should indeed despair if I might only set about it after 
your fashion. You always seem to shut your eyes to the 
mental condition of those that differ from you. Instead of 


A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 


345 


trying to understand them first, which gives the sole possible 
chance of your ever making them understand what you mean, 
you care only to present your opinions ; and that you do in 
such a fashion that they must appear to them false. You 
even make yourself seem to hold these for very love of their 
untruth ; and thus make it all but impossible for them to 
shake ofi* their fetters : every truth in advance of what they 
have already learned, will henceforth come to them associated 
with your presumed backsliding and impenitence.” 

“Goodness! where did you learn their slang?” cried 
Charley. “But impenitence, if you like, — not backsliding. 
I never made any profession. After all, however, their opin- 
ions don’t seem to hurt them — I mean my mother and sister.” 

“ They must hurt them, if only by hindering their growth. 
In time, of course, the angels of the heart will expel the 
demons of the brain ; but it is a pity the process should be 
retarded by your behaviour.” 

“ I know I am a brute, Wilfrid. I will try to hold my 
tongue.” 

“ Depend upon it,” I went on, “ whatever such hearts can 
believe, is, as believed by them, to be treated with respect. It 
is because of the truth in it, not because of the falsehood, that 
they hold it ; and when you speak against the false in it, you 
appear to them to speak against the true ; for the dogma seems 
to them an unanalyzable unit. You assail the false with the 
recklessness of falsehood itself, careless of the injury you 
may inflict on the true.” 

I was interrupted by the entrance of Clara. 

“ If you gentlemen don’t want us any more, we had better 
go,” she said. 

I left Charley to answer her, and went back into the next 
room. Mary stood where I had left her, mechanically shifting 
and arranging the volumes on a shelf at the height of her 
eyes. 

“ I think this is your ring. Miss Osborne,” I said, in a low 
and hurried tone, ofiering it. 

Her expression at first was only of questioning surprise. 


346 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


when suddenly something seemed to cross her mind ; she 
turned pale as death, and put her hand on the bookshelves as 
if to support her; as suddenly flushed crimson for a moment, 
and again turned deadly pale — all before I could speak. 

“Don’t ask me any questions, dear Miss Osborne,” I said. 
“ And, please, trust me this far : don’t mention the loss of 
your ring to any one — except it be your mother. Allow me to 
put it on your finger.” 

She gave me a glance I cannot and would not describe. It 
lies treasured — for ever, God grant! — in the secret jewel-house 
of my heart. She lifted a trembling left hand, and doubtingly 
held — half held it towards me. To this day I know nothing 
of the stones of that ring — not even their color; but I know 
I should know it at once if I saw it. My hand trembled more 
than hers as I put it on the third finger. 

What followed, I do not know. I think I left her there and 
went into the other room. When I returned a little after, I 
know she was gone. From that hour, not one word ever 
passed between us in reference to the matter. The best of my 
conjectures remains but a conjecture ; I know how the sword 
got there — nothing more. 

I did not see her again that day, and did not seem to want 
to see her, but worked on amongst the books in a quiet exalta- 
tion. My being seemed tenfold awake and alive. My thoughts 
dwelt on the rarely revealed loveliness of my Athanasia ; and 
although I should have scorned unspeakably to take the 
smallest advantage of having come to share a secret with her, 
could not help rejoicing in the sense of nearness to and alone- 
ness with her which the possession of that secret gave me ; 
while one of the most precious results of the new love which 
had thus all at once laid hold upon me, was the feeling — almost 
a conviction — that the dream was not a web self-wove in the 
loom of my brain, but that from somewhere, beyond my soul 
even, an influence had mingled with its longings to in-form the 
vision of that night — to be as it were a creative soul to what 
would otherwise have been but loose, chaotic, and shapeless 
vagaries of the unguided imagination. The events of that 


A TALK ABOUT SUICIDE. 


347 


night were as the sudden opening of a door through which I 
caught a glimpse of that region of the supernal in which, 
whatever might be her theories concerning her experiences 
therein, Mary Osborne certainly lived, if ever any one lived. 
The degree of God’s presence with a creature is not to be 
measured by that creature’s interpretation of the manner in 
which He is revealed. The great question is whether He is 
revealed or no ; and a strong truth can carry many parasitical 
errors. 

I felt that now I could talk freely to her of what most per- 
plexed me — not so much, I confess, with any hope that she 
might cast light on my difficulties, as in the assurance that she 
would not only influence me to think purely and nobly, but 
would urge me in the search after God. In such a relation of 
love to religion the vulgar mind will ever imagine ground for 
ridicule; but those who have most regarded human nature 
know well enough that the two have constantly manifested 
themselves in the closest relation ; while even the poorest love 
is the enemy of selfishness unto the death ; for the one or the 
other must give up the ghost. Not only must God be in all 
that is human, but of it He must be the root. 


348 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER XLIIL 

THE SWORD IN THE SCALE. 

The next morning Charley and I went as usual to the 
library, where later in the day we were joined by the two 
ladies. It was long before our eyes once met, but when at last 
they did, Mary allowed hers to rest on mine for just one mo- 
ment with an expression of dove-like beseeching, which I dared 
to interpret as meaning — “Be just to me.” If she read mine, 
surely she read there that she was safe with my thoughts as 
with those of her mother. 

Charley and I worked late in the afternoon, and went away 
in the last of the twilight. As we approached the gate of the 
park, however, I remembered I had left behind me a book I 
had intended to carry home for comparison with a copy in my 
possession of which the title-page was gone. I asked Charley 
therefore to walk on and give my man some directions about 
Lilith, seeing I had it in my mind to propose a ride on the 
morrow, while I went back to fetch it. 

Finding the door at the foot of the stair leading to the open 
gallery ajar, and knowing that none of the rooms at either end 
of it were occupied, I went the nearest way, and thus entered 
the library at the point farthest from the more public parts of 
the house. The book I sought was however at the other end 
of the suite, for I had laid it on the window-sill of the room 
next the armory. 

As I entered that room, and while I crossed it towards the 
glimmering window, I heard voices in the armory, and soon 
distinguished Clara’s. It never entered my mind that possibly 
I ought not to hear what might be said. Just as I reached 
the window I was arrested, and stood stock-still ; the other 
voice was that of Geoffrey Brotherton. Before my self-posses- 
sion returned, I had heard what follows : 


THE SWORD IN THE SCALE. 


349 


** 1 am certain he took it,” said Clara. “ I didn’t see him, 
of course ; but if you call at the Moat to-morrow, ten to one 
you will find it hanging on the wall.” 

“ I knew him for a sneak, but never took him for a thief I 
would have lost anything out of the house rather than that 
sword !” 

“ Don’t you mention my name in it. If you do, I shall 
think you — well, I will never speak to you again.” 

“ And if I don’t, what then ?” 

Before I heard her answer, I had come to myself. I had no 
time for indignation yet. I must meet Geoffrey at once. I 
would not however have him know I had overheard any of 
their talk. It would have been more straightforward to allow 
the fact to be understood, but I shrunk from giving him occa- 
sion for accusing me of an eavesdropping of which I was inno- 
cent. Besides, I had no wish to encounter Clara before I 
understood her game, which I need not say was a mystery to 
me. What end could she have in such duplicity ? I had had 
unpleasant suspicions of the truth of her nature before, but 
could never have suspected her of baseness. 

I stepped quietly into the further room, whence I returned, 
making a noise with the door-handle, and saying, 

“ Are you there. Miss Coningham ? Could you help me to 
find a book I left here ?” 

There was silence ; but, after the briefest pause, I heard the 
sound of her dress as she swept hurriedly out into the gallery. 
I advanced. On the top of the steps, filling the doorway of 
the armory in the faint light from the window, appeared the 
dim form of Brotherton. 

“I beg your pardon,” I said. *‘1 heard a lady’s voice, and 
thought it was Miss Coningham’s.” 

“ I cannot compliment your ear,” he answered. “ It was 
one of the maids. I had just rung for a light. I presume you 
are Mr. Cumbermede.” 

“Yes,” I answered. “I returned to fetch a book I forgot 
to take with me. I suppose you have heard what we’ve been 
about in the library here ?” 


350 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I have been partially informed of it,” he answered stiffly. 
“But I have heard also that you contemplate a raid upon the 
armory. I beg you will let the weapons alone.” 

I had said something of the sort to Clara that very morning. 

“I have a special regard for them,” he went on: “and I 
don’t want them meddled with. It’s not every one knows how 
to handle them. Some amongst them I would not have injured 
for their weight in diamonds. One in particular I should like 
to give you the history of— just to show you that I am right in 
being careful over them. — Here comes the light I” 

I presume it had been hurriedly arranged between them as 
Clara left him that she should send one of the maids, who in 
consequence made her appearance with a candle. Brotherton 
took it from her and approached the wall. 

“ Why ! What the devil ! Some one has been meddling 
already, I find ! The very sword I speak of is gone I There’s 
the sheath hanging empty I What can it mean? Do you 
know anything of this, Mr. Cumbermede ?” 

“I do, Mr. Brotherton. The sword to which that sheath 
belongs is mine. I have it.” 

“ Yours /” he shouted; then restraining himself, added in a 
tone of utter contempt — “ This is rather too much. Pray, sir, on 
what grounds do you lay claim to the smallest atom of property 
within these walls ? My father ought to have known what he 
was about when he let you have the run of the house ! The old 
books, too! By heavens, it’s too much I I always thought 

“ It matters little to me what you think, Mr. Brotherton — 
so little that I do not care to take any notice of your inso- 
lence ” 

“ Insolence !” he roared, striding towards me, as if he would 
have knocked me down. 

I was not his match in strength, for he was at least two 
inches taller than I, and of a coarse-built, powerful frame. 
I caught a light rapier from the wall, and stood on my defence. 

“ Coward I” he cried. 

“ There are more where this came from,” I answered, point- 
ing to the wall. 


THE SWORD IN THE SCALE. 351 

He made no move towards arming himself, but stood 
glaring at me in a white rage. 

“ I am prepared to prove,” I answered as calmly as I could, 

that the sword to which you allude is mine. But I wUl give 
yoiL no explanation. If you will oblige me by asking your 
father to join us, I will tell him the whole story.” 

“ I will have a warrant out against you.” 

“ As you please. I am obliged to you for mentioning it. 
I shall be ready. I have the sword and intend to keep it. 
And by the way, I had better secure the scabbard as well,” I 
added, as with a sudden spring I caught it also from the wall, 
and again stood prepared. 

He ground his teeth with rage. He was one of those who, 
trusting to their superior strength, are not much afraid of a 
row, but cannot face cold steel : soldier as he had been, it made 
him nervous. 

“ Insulted in my own house !” he snarled from beneath his 
teeth. 

“ Your father’s house,” I corrected. “ Call him, and I will 
give explanations.” 

“ Damn your explanations ! Get out of the house, you 
puppy ; or I’ll have the servants up and have you ducked in 
the horse-pond.” 

“ Bah !” I said. “ There’s not one of them would lay hands 
on me at your bidding. Call your father, I say, or I will go 
and find him myself.” 

He broke out in a succession of oaths, using language I 
had heard in the streets of London, but nowhere else. I stood 
perfectly still, and watchful. All at once, he turned and went 
into the gallery, over the balustrade of which he shouted, 

“ Martin ! Go and tell my father to come here — to the armory 
— at once. Tell him there’s a fellow here out of his mind.” 

I remained quiet, with my scabbard in one hand, and the 
rapier in the other — a dangerous weapon enough, for it was, 
though slight, as sharp as a needle, and I knew it for a bit 
of excellent temper. Brotherton stood outside waiting for his 
father. In a few moments I heard the voice of the old man. 


352 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Boys ! boys !” he cried ; “ what is all this to-do ? ” 

“ Why, sir,” answered Geoffrey, trying to be calm, “ here’s 
that fellow Cumbermede confesses to have stolen the most 
valuable of the swords out of the armory — one that’s been in 
the family for two hundred years, and says he means to keep it.” 

I just caught the word liar ere it escaped my lips : I would 
spare the son in his father’s presence. 

“ Tut ! tut !” said Sir Giles. “ What does it all mean ? 
You’re at your old quarrelsome tricks, my boy ! Really you 
ought to be wiser by this time!” 

As he spoke he entered panting, and with the rubicund 
glow beginning to return upon a face from which the message 
had evidently banished it. 

“ Tut I tut I” he said again, half starting back as he caught 
sight of me with the weapon in my hand — “ What is it all 
about, Mr. Cumbermede ? I thought you had more sense I” 

“ Sir Giles,” I said, “ I have not confessed to have stolen 
the sword — only to have taken it.” 

“ A very different thing,” he returned, trying to laugh. 
“ But come now ; tell me all about it. We can’t have quarrel- 
ling like this, you know. We can’t have pot-house work here.” 

“ That is just why I sent for you. Sir Giles,” I answered, 
replacing the rapier on the wall. “ I want to tell you the 
whole story.” 

Let’s have it then.” 

“ Mind I don’t believe a word of it,” said Geoffrey. 

“ Hold your tongue, sir,” said his father 
Mr. Brotherton,” I said, “ I offered to tell the story to Sir 
Giles — not to you.” 

“You offered!” he sneered. “You maybe compelled — 
under different circumstances by and by, if you don’t mind 
what you’re about.” 

“ Come now — no more of this !” said Sir Giles. 

Thereupon I began at the beginning, and told him the story 
of the sword, as I have already given it to my reader. He 
fidgeted a little, but Geoffrey kept himself stock-still during the 
whole of the narrative. As soon as I had ended Sir Giles said: 


THE SWORD IN THE SCALE. 


353 


“ And you think poor old Close actually carried off your 
sword I Well, he was an odd creature, and had a passion 
for everything that could kill. The poor little atomy used to 
carry a poniard in the breast pocket of his black coat — as if 
anybody would ever have thought of attacking his small car- 
cass ! Ha ! ha I ha ! He was simply a monomaniac in regard 
of swords and daggers. There, Geoffrey ! The sword is plainly 
his. He is the wronged party in the matter, and we owe him 
an apology.” 

“ I believe the whole to be a pure invention,” said Geoffrey, 
who now appeared perfectly calm. 

“ Mr. Brotherton !” I began, but Sir Giles interposed. 

“ Hush ! hush !” he said, and turned to his son. My boy, 
you insult your father’s guest.” 

“ I will at once prove to you, sir, how unworthy he is of any 
forbearance, not to say protection from you. Excuse me for 
one moment.” 

He took up the candle, and opening the little door at the 
foot of the winding stair, disappeared. Sir Giles and I sat in 
silence, and darkness until he returned, carrying in his hand 
an old vellum-bound book. 

I dare say you don’t know this manuscript, sir,” he said, 
turning to his father. 

“ I know nothing about it,” answered Sir Giles. ** What is 
it ? Or what has it to do with the matter in hand ?” 

“ Mr. Close found it in some corner or other, and used to 
read it to me when I was a little fellow. It is a description, 
and in most cases a history as well, of every weapon in the 
armory. They had been much neglected, and a great many 
of the labels were gone, but those which were left referred to 
numbers in the book heading descriptions which corresponded 
exactly to the weapons on which they were found. With a 
little trouble he had succeeded in supplying the numbers where 
they were missing, for the descriptions are very minute.” 

He spoke in a tone of perfect self-possession. 

“ Well, Geoffrey, I ask again, what has all this to do with 
it?” said the father. 

23 


354 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ If Mr. Cumbermede will allow you to look at the label 
attached to the sheath in his hand, for fortunately it was a rule 
with Mr. Close to put a label on both sword and sheath, and 
if* you will read me the number, I will read you the description 
in the book.” 

I handed the sheath to Sir Giles, who began to decipher the 
number on the ivory ticket. 

“ The label is quite a new one,” I said. 

I have already accounted for that,” said Brotherton. “ I 
will leave it to yourself to decide whether the description 
corresponds.” 

Sir Giles read out the numbers, figure by figure, adding ■— 

“ But how are we to test the description ? I don’t know the 
thing, and it’s not here.” 

“ It is at the Moat,” I replied; “ but its fixture place is at 
Sir Giles’s decision.” 

“ Part of the description belongs to the scabbard you have 
in your hand, sir,” said Brotherton. “ The description of the 
sword itself I submit to Mr. Cumbermede.” 

“ Till the other day I never saw the blade,” I said. 

“ Likely enough,” he retorted dryly, and proceeding, read 
the description of the half-basket hilt, inlaid with ornaments 
and initials in gold. 

“ There is nothing in all that about the scabbard,” said his 
father. 

“Stop till we come to the history,” he replied, and read on, 
as nearly as I can recall, to the following effect. I have never 
had an opportunity of copying the words themselves. 

“‘This sword seems to have been expressly forged for 

Sir ’ ” (he read it Sir So and So) “ ‘ whose initials 

are to be found on the blade. According to tradition, it was 
worn by him, for the first and only time, at the battle of 
Naseby, where he fought in the cavalry led by Sir Marma- 

duke Langdale. From some accident or other. Sir 

found, just as the order to charge was given, that he could not 
draw his sword, and had to charge with only a pistol in his 
hand. In the flight which followed, he pulled up, and un- 


THE SWOKD IN THE SCALE. 


355 


buckled his sword, but while attempting to case it, a rush of 
the enemy startled him, and, looking about, he saw a round- 
head riding straight at Sir Marmaduke, who that moment 
passed in the rear of his retiring troops, giving some directions 
to an officer by his side, and unaware of the nearness of 

danger. Sir put spurs to his charger, rode at the 

trooper, and dealt him a downright blow on the pot-helmet 
with his sheathed weapon. The fellow tumbled from his 

horse, and Sir found his scabbard split half-way up, 

but the edge of his weapon unturned. It is said he vowed 
it should remain sheathed forever.’ — The person who has now 
unsheathed it,” added Brotherton, “ has done a great wrong to 
the memory of a royal cavalier.” 

“ The sheath half-way split was as familiar to my eyes as 
the face of my uncle,” I said, turning to Sir Giles. “ And in 
the only reference I ever heard my great-grandmother make to 
it, she mentioned the name of Sir Marmaduke. I recollect 
that much perfectly.” 

“ But how could the sword be there and here at one and 
the same time ?” said Sir Giles. 

“ Thai I do not pretend to explain,” I said. 

“ Here at least is written testimony of our possession of it,” 
said Brotherton in a conclusive tone. 

“ How then are we to explain Mr. Cumbermede’s story ?” 
said Sir Giles, evidently in good faith. 

“ With that I cannot consent to allow myself concerned. — 
Mr. Cumbermede is, I am told, a writer of fiction.” 

“Geofirey,” said Sir Giles, “ behave yourself like a gentleman.” 

“ I endeavor to do so,” he returned with a sneer. 

I kept silence. 

“ How can you suppose,” the old man went on, “ that Mr. 
Cumbermede would invent such a story ? What object could 
he have ?” 

He may have a mania for weapons, like old Close — as 
well as for old books,” he replied. 

I thought of my precious folio. But I did not yet know 
how much additional force his insinuation with regard to the 


356 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


motive of my labors in the library would gain if it should be 
discovered in my possession. 

“ You may have remarked, sir,” he went on, “ that I did not 
read the name of the owner of the sword in any place where it 
occurred in the manuscript.” 

“ I did. And I beg to know why you kept it back,” an- 
swered Sir Giles. 

“ What do you think the name might be, sir ?” 

“ How should I know ? I am not an antiquarian.” 

“Sir Wilfrid Cumhermede. You will find the initials on 
the blade. Does that throw any light on the matter, do you 
think, sir?” 

“ Why that is your very own name I” cried Sir Giles, turning 
to me. 

I bowed. 

“ It is a pity the sword shouldn’t be yours ?” 

“ It is mine. Sir Giles — though, as I said, I am prepared to 
abide by your decision.” 

“ And now I remember” — the old man resumed, after a 
moment’s thought — “the other evening Mr. Alderforge — a 
man of great learning, Mr. Cumbermede — told us that the 
name of Cumbermede had at one time belonged to our family 
It is all very strange. I confess I am utterly bewildered.” 

“ At least you can understand, sir, how a man of imagination, 
like Mr. Cumbermede here, might desire to possess himself of 
a weapon which bears his initials, and belonged two hundred 
years ago to a baronet of the same name as himself — a circum- 
stance which, notwithstanding it is by no means a comm<^n 
name, is not quite so strange as at first sight appears — that is, 
if all reports are true.” 

I did not in the least understand his drift ; neither did I 
care to inquire into it now. 

“Were you aware of this, Mr. Cumbermede?” asked his 
father. 

“ No, Sir Giles,” I answered. 

“ Mr. Cumbermede has had the run of the place for weeks. I 
am sorry I was not at home. This book was lying all that time 


THE SWORD IN THE SCALE. 357 

on the table in the room above, where poor old Close’s work- 
bench and polishing-wheel are still standing.” 

“ Mr. Brotherton, this gets beyond bearing,” I cried. “ No- 
thing but the presence of your father, to whom I am indebted 
for much kindness, protects you.” 

“ Tut ! tut !” said Sir Giles. 

“ Protects me, indeed !” exclaimed Brotherton. “ Do you 
dream I should be by any code bound to accept a challenge 
from you? Not, at least, I presume to think, before a jury 
had decided on the merits of the case.” 

My blood was boiling, but what could I do or say ? Sir 
Giles rose, and was about to leave the room, remarking only — 

“ I don’t know what to make of it.” 

“ At all events, Sir Giles,” I said, hurriedly, “ you will allow 
me to prove the truth of what I have asserted. I cannot, 
unfortunately, call my uncle or aunt, for they are gone ; and I 
do not know where the servant who was with us when I took 
the sword away, is now. But, if you will allow me, I will call 
Mrs. Wilson to prove that I had the sword when I came to 
visit her on that occasion, and that on the morning after 
sleeping here I complained of its loss to her, and went away 
without it.” 

“ It would but serve to show the hallucination was early 
developed. We should probably find that even then you 
were much attracted by the armory,” said Brotherton, with a 
judicial air, as if I were a culprit before a magistrate. 

I had begun to see that, although the old man was desirous 
of being just, he was a little afraid of his son. He rose as the 
latter spoke, however, and going into the gallery, shouted over 
the balustrade : 

“ Some one send Mrs. Wilson to the library.” 

We removed to the reading-room, I carrying the scabbard, 
which Sir Giles had returned to me as soon as he had read the 
label. Brotherton followed, having first gone up the little 
turnpike stair, doubtless to replace the manuscript. 

Mrs. Wilson came, looking more pinched than ever, and 
stood before Sir Giles with her arms straight by her sides, like 


358 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


one of the ladies of Noah’s ark. I will not weary my reader 
with a full report of the examination. She had seen me idth 
a sword, but had taken no notice of its appearance. I might 
have taken it from the armory, for I was in the library all the 
afternoon, She had left me there thinking I was a “gentle- 
manly ” boy. I had said I had lost it, but she was sure she 
did not know how that could be. She was very sorry she had 
caused any trouble by asking me to the house, but Sir Giles 
would be pleased to remember that he had himself introduced 
the boy to her notice. Little as she thought, etc., etc. 

In fact, the spiteful creature, propitiating her natural sense 
of justice by hinting instead of plainly suggesting injurious 
conclusions, was paying me back for my imagined participation 
in the impertinences of Clara. She had, besides, as I learned 
afterwards, greatly resented the trouble I had caused of late. 

Brotherton struck in as soon as his father had ceased 
questioning her. 

“ At all events, if he believed the sword was his, why did he 
not go and represent the case to you, sir, and request justice 
from you ? Since then he has had opportunity enough. His 
tale has taken too long to hatch.” 

“ This is all very paltry,” I said. 

“Not so paltry as your contriving to sleep in the house in 
order to carry off your host’s property in the morning — after 
studying the place to discover which room would suit your 
purpose best !” 

Here I lost my presence of mind. A horror struck me lest 
something might come out to injure Mary, and I shivered at 
the thought of her name being once mentioned along with mine. 
If I had taken a moment to reflect, I must have seen that I 
should only add to the danger by what I was about to say. 
But her form was so inextricably associated in my mind with 
all that had happened then, that it seemed as if the slightest 
allusion to any event of that night would inevitably betray 
her ; and in the tremor which, like an electric shock, passed 
through me from head to foot, I brunted out words importing 
that I had never slept in the house in my life. 


THE SWOPwD IN THE SCALE. 


359 


“ Your room was got ready for you, anyhow, Master Cum- 
bermede,” said Mrs. Wilson. 

“ It does not follow that 1 occupied it,” I returned. 

“ I can prove that false,” said Brotherton ; but probably 
lest he should be required to produce his witness, only added, 
— “ At all events he was seen in the morning, carrying the 
sword across the court before any one had been admitted.” 

I was silent ; for I now saw too clearly that I had made a 
dreadful blunder, and any attempt to carry assertion further, 
or even to explain away my words, might be to challenge the 
very discovery I would have given my life to ward off. 

As I continued silent, steeling myself to endure, and saying 
to myself that disgrace was not dishonor. Sir Giles again rose, 
and turned to leave the room. Evidently he was now satisfied 
that I was unworthy of confidence. 

“One moment, if you please. Sir Giles,” I said. “It is 
plain to me there is some mystery about this affair, and it does 
not seem as if I should be able to clear it up. The time may 
come, however, when I can. I did wrong, I see now, in 
attempting to right myself, instead of representing my case to 
you. But that does not alter the fact that the sword was and 
is mine, however appearances may be to the contrary. In the 
meantime, I restore you the scabbard, and as soon as I reach 
home, I shall send my man with the disputed weapon.” 

“ It will be your better way,” he said, as he took the sheath 
from my hand. 

Without another word he left the room. Mrs. Wilson also 
retired. Brotherton alone remained. I took no further 
notice of him, but followed Sir Giles through the armory. 
He came after me, step for step, at a little distance, and as I 
stepped out into the gallery, said in a tone of insulting polite- 
ness : 

“ You will send the sword as soon as may be quite conve- 
nient, Mr. Cumbermede ? Or shall I send and fetch it ?” 

I turned and faced him in the dim light that came up from 
the hall. 

“ Mr. Brotherton, if you know that book and those weapons 


360 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


as early as you have just said, you cannot help knowing that 
at that time the sword was not there.” 

“ I decline to reopen the question,” he said. 

A fierce word leaped to my lips, but repressing it, I turned 
away once more, and walked slowly down the stair, across the 
hall, and out of the house. 


I PART WITH MY SWORD. 


361 


CHAPTER XLIV. 

I PART WITH MY SWORD. 

I MADE haste out of the park, but wandered up and down 
my own field for half an hour, thinking in what shape to put 
what had occurred before Charley. My perplexity arose not 
so much from the difficulty involved in the matter itself, as 
from my inability to fix my thoughts. My brain was for the 
time like an ever-revolving kaleidoscope, in which, however, 
there was but one fair color — the thought of Mary. Having at 
length succeeded in arriving at some conclusion, I went home, 
and would have despatched Styles at once with the sword, had 
not Charley already sent him off to the stable ; so that I must 
wait. 

“ What has kept you so long, Wilfrid ?” Charley asked as I 
entered. 

“ IVe had a tremendous row with Brotherton,” I answered. 

The brute ! Is he there ? I’m glad I was gone. What 
was it all about ?” 

“ About that sword. It was very foolish of me to take it 
without saying a word to Sir Giles.” 

‘‘ So it was,” he returned. “ I can’t think how you could be 
so foolish.” 

I could, well enough. What with the dream and the waking, 
I could think little about anything else ; and only since the 
consequences had overtaken me, saw how unwisely I had acted. 
I now told Charley the greater part of the affair — omitting the 
false step I had made in saying I had not slept in the house ; 
and also, still with the vague dread of leading to some dis- 
covery, omitting to report the treachery of Clara; for, if Charley 
should talk to her or Mary about it, which was possible enough, 
I saw several points where the danger would lie very close. I 
simply told him that I had found Brotherton in the armoryj 
and reported what followed between us. I did not at all 


362 


WILFRID CUMBEKMEDE. 


relish having now in my turn secrets from Charley, but my 
conscience did not trouble me about it, seeing it was for his 
sister’s sake ; and when I saw the rage of indignation into 
which he flew, I was, if possible, yet more certain I was right 
I told him I must go and find Styles, that he might take the 
sword at once; but he started up, saying he would carry it 
back himself, and at the same time take his leave of Sir Giles, 
whose house of course he could never enter again after the 
way I had been treated in it I saw this would lead to a rup- 
ture with the whole family, but I should not regret that, for 
there could be no advantage to Mary either in continuing her 
intimacy, such as it was, with Clara, or in making further 
acquaintance with Brotherton. The time of their departure 
was also close at hand, and might be hastened without neces- 
sarily involving much of the unpleasant. Also, if Charley 
broke with them at once, there would be the less danger of his 
coming to know that I had not given him all the particulars 
of my discomfiture. If he were to find I had told a false- 
hood, how could I explain to him why I had done so ? This 
arguing on probabilities made me feel like a culprit who has 
to protect himself by concealment ; but I will not dwell upon 
my discomfort in the half duplicity thus forced upon me. I 
could not help it. I got down the sword, and together we 
looked at it for the first and last time. I found the descrip- 
tion contained in the book perfectly correct. The upper part 
was inlaid with gold in a Greekish pattern crossed by the 
initials W. C. I gave it up to Charley with a sigh of submis- 
sion to the inevitable, and having accompanied him to the 
park-gate, roamed my field again until his return. 

He rejoined me in a far quieter mood, and for a moment or 
two I was silent with the terror of learning that he had 
become acquainted with my unhappy blunder. After a little 
pause, he said, 

“ I’m very sorry I didn’t see Brotherton. I should have 
liked just a word or two with him.” 

“ It’s just as well not,” I said. “ You would only have 
made another row. Didn’t you see any of them ?” 


I PART WITH MY SWORD. 


363 


“ I saw the old man. He seemed really cut up about it, 
and professed great concern. He didn’t even refer to you by 
name — and spoke only in general terms. I told him you were 
incapable of what was laid to your charge ; that I had not the 
slightest doubt of your claim to the sword, — your word being 
enough for me — and that I trusted time would right you. I 
went too far there, however, for I haven’t the slightest hope 
of anything of the sort.” 

“ How did he take all that ?” 

“He only smiled — incredulously and sadly, — so that I 
couldn’t find it in my heart to tell him all my mind. I only 
insisted on my own perfect confidence in you. I’m afraid I 
made a poor advocate, Wilfrid. Why should I mind his gray 
hairs where justice was concerned ? I am afraid I was false 
to you, Wilfrid.” 

“ Nonsense ; you did just the right thing, old boy. Nobody 
could have done better.” 

“ Do you think so ? I am so glad ! I have been feeling 
ever since as if I ought to have gone into a rage, and shaken 
the dust of the place from my feet as a witness against the 
whole nest of them I But somehow I couldn’t — what with the 
honest face and the sorrowful look of the old man.” 

“ You are always too much of a partisan, Charley ; I don’t 
mean so much in your actions — for this very one disproves 
that — but in your notions of obligation. You forget that 
you had to be just to Sir Giles as well as to me, and that he 
must be judged — ^not by the absolute facts of the case, but 
by what appeared to him to be the facts. He could not help 
misjudging me. But you ought to help misjudging him. So 
you see your behaviour was guided by an instinct or a soul, 
or what you will, deeper than your judgment.” 

“ That may be — but he ought to have known you better 
than believe you capable of misconduct.” 

“ I don’t know that. He had seen very little of me. But 
I dare say he puts it down to cleptomania. I think he will be 
kind enough to give the ugly thing a fine name for my sake. 
Besides, he must hold either by his son or by me.” 


364 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ That’s the worst that can be said on my side of the ques- 
tion. He must by this time be aware that that son of his is 
nothing better than a low scoundrel.” 

“ It takes much to convince a father of such an unpleasant 
truth as that, Charley.” 

“ Not much, if my experience goes for anything.” 

“ I trust it is not typical, Charley.” 

“ I suppose you’re going to stand up for Geoffrey next ?” 

“ I have no such intention. But if I did, it would be but 
to follow your example. We seem to change sides every now 
and then. You remember how you used to defend Clara 
when I expressed my doubts about her.” 

“ And wasn’t I right ? Didn’t you come over to my side ?” 

“Yes, I did,” I said, and hastened to change the subject ; 
adding, “As for Geoffrey, there is room enough to doubt 
whether he believes what he says, and that makes a serious dif- 
ference. In thinking over the affair since you left me, I have 
discovered further grounds for questioning his truthfulness.” 

“ As if that were necessary !” he exclaimed with an accent 
of scorn. “ But tell me what you mean,” he added. 

“ In turning the thing over in my mind, this question has 
occurred to me. He read from the manuscript, that on the 
blade of the sword, near the hilt, were the initials of Wilfrid 
Cumbermede. Now, if the sword had never been drawn from 
the scabbard, how was that to be known to the writer ?” 

“ Perhaps, it was written about that time,” said Charley. 

“No; the manuscript was evidently written some considera- 
ble time after. It refers to tradition concerning it.” 

“ Then the writer knew it by tradition.” 

The moment Charley’s logical faculty was excited, his per- 
ception was impartial. 

“ Besides,” he went on, “ it does not follow that the sword 
had really never been drawn before. Mr. Close even may 
have done so, for his admiration was apparently quite as 
much for weapons themselves as for their history. Clara 
could hardly have drawn it as she did, if it had not been 
meddled with before.” 


I PART with my sword. 365 

The terror lest he should ask me how I came to carry it 
home without the scabbard, hurried my objection. 

“ That supposition, however, would only imply that Bro- 
therton might have learned the fact from the sword itself, not 
from the book. I should just like to have one peep of the 
manuscript to see whether what he read was all there T’ 

“ Or any of it, for that matter,^’ said Charley. “ Only it 
would have been a more tremendous risk than I think he 
would have run.” 

“I wish I had thought of it sooner, though.” 

My suspicion was that Clara had examined the blade 
thoroughly, and given him a full description of it. He might, 
however, have been at the Hall on some previous occasion, 
without my knowledge, and might have seen the half-drawn 
blade on the wall, examined it, and pushed it back into the 
sheath; which might have so far loosened the blade, that 
Clara was afterwards able to draw it herself. I was all but 
certain by this time that it was no other than she that had 
laid it on my bed. But then why had she drawn it ? Perhaps 
that I might leave proof of its identity behind me — for the 
carrying out of her treachery, whatever the object of it might 
be. But this opened a hundred questions not to be discussed, 
even in silent thought, in the presence of another. 

“ Did you not see your mother, Charley ?” I asked. 

“No. I thought it better not to trouble her. They are 
going to-morrow. Mary had persuaded her — why, I don’t 
know — to return a day or two sooner than they had intended.” 

“ I hope Brotherton wiU not succeed in prejudicing them 
against me.” 

“I wish that were possible,” he answered. “But the time 
for prejudi3e is long gone by.” 

I could not believe this to be the case in respect to Mary ; 
for I could not but think her favorably inclined to me. 

“Still,” I said, “I should not like their bad opinion of me to 
be enlarged as well as strengthened by the belief that I had 
attempted to steal Sir Giles’s property. You must stand my 
friend there, Charley.” 


366 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“Then you do doubt me, Wilfrid ?’’ 

“Not a bit, you foolish fellow/’ 

“ You know, I can’t enter that house again, and I don’t 
care about writing to my mother, for my father is sure to see 
it ; but I will follow my mother aud Mary the moment they 
are out of the grounds to-morrow, and soon see whether 
they’ve got the story by the right end.” 

The evening passed with me in alternate fits of fierce in- 
dignation and profound depression, for, while I was clear to 
my own conscience in regard of my enemies, I had yet thrown 
myself bound at their feet by my foolish lie ; and I all but 
made up my mind to leave the country, and only return after 
having achieved such a position — of what sort I had no more 
idea than the school-boy before he sets himself to build a new 
castle in the air — as would buttress any assertion of the facts 
I might see fit to make in after years. 

When we had parted for the night my brains began to go 
about, and the center of their gyration was not Mary now, 
but Clara. What could have induced her to play me false ? 
All my vanity, of which I had enough, was insufficient to 
persuade me that it could be out of revenge for the gradual 
diminution of my attentions to her. She had seen me pay 
none to Mary, I thought, except she had caught a glimpse 
from the next room of the little passage of the ring, and that 
I did not believe. Neither did I believe she had ever cared 
enough about me to be jealous of whatever attentions I might 
pay to another. But in all my conjectures, I had to confess 
myself utterly foiled. I could imagine no motive. Two 
possibilities alone, both equally improbable, suggested them- 
selves — the one, that she did it for pure love of mischief 
which, false as she was to me, I could not believe ; the other, 
which likewise I rejected, that she wanted to ingratiate herself 
with Brotherton. I had still, however, scarcely a doubt that 
she had laid the sword on my bed. Trying to imagine a con- 
nection between this possible action and Mary’s mistake, I 
built up a conjectural form of conjectural facts to this efiect 
— that Mary had seen her go into my room ; had taken it for 


I PART WITH MY SWORD. 367 

the room she was to share with her, and had followed hei 
either at once — in which case I supposed Clara to have gone 
out by the stair to the roof to avoid being seen — or after- 
wards, from some accident, without a light m her hand. But 
I do not care to set down more of my speculations, for none 
concerning this either were satisfactory to myself, and I 
remain almost as much in the dark to this day. In any case 
the fear remained that Clara must be ever on the borders of 
the discovery of Mary’s secret, if indeed she did not know it 
already, which was a dreadful thought — more especially as I 
could place no confidence in her. I was glad to think, how^ 
ever, that they were to be parted so soon, and I had little fear 
of any correspondence between them. 

The next morning Charley set out to waylay them at a cer- 
tain point on their homeward journey. I did not propose to 
accompany him. I preferred having him speak for me first, 
not knowing how much they might have heard to my dis- 
credit, for it was far from probable the matter had been kept 
from them. After he had started, however, I could not rest, 
and for pure restlessness sent Styles to fetch my mare. The 
loss of my sword was a trifle to me now, but the proximity of 
the place where I should henceforth be regarded as what I 
hardly dared to realize, was almost unendurable. As if I had 
actually been guilty of what was laid to my charge, I longed 
to hide myself in some impenetrable depth, and kept looking 
out impatiently for Styles’s return. At length I caught sight 
of my Lilith’s head rising white from the hollow in which the 
farm lay, and ran up to my room to make a little change in 
my attire. Just as I snatched my riding-whip from a hook by 
the window, I spied a horseman approaching from the direc- 
tion of the park gates. Once more it was Mr. Coningham, 
riding hitherward from the windy trees. In no degree in- 
clined to meet him, I hurried down the stair, and arriving at 
the very moment Styles drew up, sprang into the saddle, and 
would have galloped off in the opposite direction, confident 
that no horse of Mr. Coningham’s could overtake my Lilith. 
But the moment I was in the saddle, I remembered there was 


368 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


a pile of books on the window-sill of my uncle’s room, belong- 
ing to the library at the Hall, and I stopped a moment to 
give Styles the direction to take them home at once, and, 
having asked a word of Miss Pease, to request her, with my 
kind regards, to see them safely deposited amimgst the rest. 
In consequence of this delay, just as I set off at full speed 
from the door, Mr. Coningham rode round the corner of the 
house. 

“ What a devil of a hurry you are in, Mr. Cumbermede V* 
he cried. “ I was just coming to see you. Can’t you spare 
me a word?” 

I was forced to pull up, and reply as civiUy as might be. 

“ I am only going for a ride,” I said, “ and will go part of 
your way with you if you like.” 

“ Thank you. That will suit me admirably. I am going 
Gastford way. Have you ever been there ?” 

“No,” I answered. “I have only just heard the name of 
the village.” 

“It is a pretty place. But there’s the oddest old church 
you ever saw, within a couple of miles of it — alone in the 
middle of a forest — or at least it was a forest not long ago. It 
is mostly young trees now. There isn’t a house within a mile 
of it, and the nearest stands as lonely as the church — quite a 
place to suit the fancy of a poet like you ! Come along and 
see it. You may as well go one way as another, if you only 
want a ride.” 

“ How far is it ?” I asked. 

“ Only seven or eight miles across country : I can take you 
all the way through lanes and fields.” 

Perplexed or angry I was always disinclined for speech ; and 
it was only after things had arranged themselves in my mind, 
or I had mastered my indignation, that I would begin to feel 
communicative. But something prudential inside warned me 
that I could not afford to lose any friend I had ; and although 
I was not prepared to confide my wrongs to Mr. Coningham, I 
felt I might some day be glad of his counsel. 


UMBERDEii CHURCH. 


369 


CHAPTER XLV. 

UMBERDEN CHURCH. 

My companion chatted away, lauded my mare, asked if 1 
had seen Clara lately, and how the library was getting on. I 
answered him carelessly, without even a hint at my troubles. 

“You seem out of spirits, Mr. Cumbermede,” he said. 
“ You Ve been taking too little exercise. Let’s have a canter. 
It will do you good. Here’s a nice bit of sward.” 

I was only too ready to embrace the excuse for dropping a 
conversation towards which I was unable to contribute my 
share. 

Having reached a small roadside inn, we gave our horses a 
little refreshment; after which, crossing a field or two by jump- 
ing the stiles, we entered the loveliest lane I had ever seen. It 
was so narrow that there was just room for horses to pass each 
other, and covered with the greenest sward rarely trodden. It 
ran through the midst of a wilderness of tall hazels. They 
stood up on both sides of it, straight and trim as walls, high 
above our heads as we sat on our horses ; and the lane was so 
serpentine, that we could never see farther than a few yards 
ahead ; while, towards the end, it kept turning so much in one 
direction that we seemed to be following the circumference of 
a little circle. It ceased at length at a small double-leaved 
gate of iron, to which we tied our horses before entering the 
church-yard. But instead of a neat burial-place, which the 
whole approach would have given us to expect, we found a 
desert. The grass was of extraordinary coarseness, and 
mingled with quantities of yile-looking weeds. Several of the 
graves had not even a spot of green upon them, but were mere 
heaps of yellow earth in huge lumps, mixed with large stones. 
There was not above a score of graves in the whole place, two 
or three of which only had gravestones on them. One lay 
24 


870 


WII.FRID CUMBERMEDE. 


open, with the rough yellow lumps all about it, and completed 
the desolation. The church was nearly square — small, and 
shapeless, with but four latticed windows, two on one side, one 
in the other, and the fourth in the east end. It was built partly 
o£ bricks and partly of flint stones, the walls bowed and bent, 
and the roof waved and broken. Its old age had gathered 
none of the graces of age to soften its natural ugliness, or ele- 
vate its insignificance. Except a few lichens, there was not a 
mark of vegetation about it. Not a single ivy-leaf grew on its 
spotted and wasted walls. It gave a hopeless, pagan expression 
to the whole landscape — for it stood on a rising ground from 
which we had an extensive prospect of height and hollow, corn- 
field and pasture and wood, away to the dim blue horizon. 

“You don't find it enlivening, do you — eh ?” said my com- 
panion. 

“I never saw such a frightfully desolate spot,” I said, “to 
have yet the appearance of a place of Christian worship. It 
looks as if there were a curse upon it. Are all those the graves 
of suicides and murderers ? It cannot surely be consecrated 
ground.” 

“ It’s not nice,” he said. “ I didn’t expect you to like it. I 
only said it was odd.” 

“ Is there any service held in it ?” I asked. 

“ Yes — once a fortnight or so. The rector has another living 
a few miles ofil” 

“ Where can the congregation come froth ?” 

“ Hardly from anywhere. There ain’t generally more than 
five or six, I believe. Let’s have a look at the inside of it.” 

“ The windows are much too high, and no foothold.” 

“We’ll go in.” 

“ Where can you get the key ? It must be a mile ofi* at 
least, by your own account. There’s no house nearer than that, 
you say.” 

He made me no reply, but going to the only flat gravestone, 
which stood on short thick pillars, he put his hand beneath it, 
and drew out a great rusty key. 

“ Country lawyers know a secret or two,” he said. 


UMBERDEN CHURCH. 371 

“Not always much worth knowing,” I rgoined, “if the in** 
side be no better than the outside.” 

“ We’ll have a look, anyhow,” he said, as he turned the key 
in the dry lock. 

The door snarled on its hinges and disclosed a space drearier 
certainly, and if possible uglier, than its promise. 

“ Really, Mr. Coningham,” I said, “ I don’t see why you 
should have brought me to look at this place.” 

“ It answered for a bait, at all events. You’ve had a good 
long ride, which was the best thing for you. Look what a 
wretched little vestry that is !” 

It was but a corner of the east end, divided off by a faded 
red curtain. 

“ I suppose they keep a parish register here,” he said. “ Let’s 
have a look.” 

Behind the curtain hung a dirty surplice and gown. In the 
corner stood a desk like the schoolmaster’s in a village school. 
There was a shelf with a few vellum-bound books on it, and 
nothing else, not even a chair, in the place. 

“ Yes ; there they are !” he said, as he took down one of the 
volumes from the shelf. “ This one comes to a close in the 
middle of the last century. I dare say there is something in 
this now that would be interesting enough to somebody. Who 
knows how many properties it might make change hands ?” 

“ Not many, I should think. Those matters are pretty well 
seen to now.” 

“ By some one or other — not always the rightful heirs. Life 
is full of the strangest facts, Mr. Cumbermede. If I were a 
novelist now, like you, my experience w'ould make me dare a 
good deal more in the way of invention than any novelist I 
happen to have read. Look there, for instance !” 

He pointed to the top of the last page, or, rather, the last 
half of the cover. I read as follows : 

MARRIAGES, 1748. 

" Mr. Wilfrid Cumbermede Daryll, of the Parish of , second son of Sir 

Richard DaryU of Moldwarp Hall in the County of , and Mistress Elizas 

beth Woodruffe were married by a license Jan. 15.” 


S72 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I don’t know the name of Daryll,” I said. 

“It was your own great-grandfather’s name,” he returned. 
“ I happen to know that much.” 

“You knew this was here, Mr. Coningham,” I said. “That 
is why you brought me.” 

“You are right. I did know it. Was I wrong in thinking 
it would interest you ?” 

“ Certainly not. I am obliged to you. But why this mys- 
tery ? Why not have told me what you wanted me to go for?” 

“ I will why you in turn. Why should I have wanted to 
show you now more than any other time what I have known 
for as many years almost as you have lived ? You spoke of a 
ride — why shouldn’t I give a direction to it that might pay 
you for your trouble ? And why shouldn’t I have a little 
amusement out of it if I pleased ? Why shouldn’t I enjoy 
your surprise at finding in a place you had hardly heard of, 
and would certainly count most uninteresting, the record of a 
fact that concerned your own existence so nearly? There!” 

“ I confess it interests me more than you will easily think — 
inasmuch as it seems to offer to account for things that have 
greatly puzzled me for some time. I have of late met with 
several hints of a connection at one time or other between the 
Moat and the Hall, but these hints were so isolated that I 
could weave no theory to connect them. Now I dare say they 
will clear themselves up.” 

“ Not a doubt of that, if you set about it in earnest.” 

“ How did he come to drop his surname ?” 

“ That has to be accounted for.” 

“It follows— does it not ? — that I am of the same blood as 
the present possessors of Moldwarp Hall ?” 

“You are -but the relation is not a close one,” said Mr. 
Coningham. “ Sir Giles was but distantly related to the stock 
of which you come.” 

“ Then — but I must turn it over in my mind. I am rather 
in a maze.” 

“ You have got some papers at the Moat ?” he said — inter- 
rogatively. 


tJMBEEDEN CHURCH. 


873 


*‘Yes; my friend Osborne has been looking over them. He 
found out this much — that there was once some connection 
between the Moat and the Hall, but at a far earlier date than 
this points to, or any of the hints to which I just now referred. 
The other day, when I dined at Sir Giles’s, Mr. Alderforge 
said that Cumbermede was a name belonging to Sir Giles’s 
ancestry— or something to that effect ; but that again could 
have had nothing to do with those papers, or with the Moat 
at aU.” 

Here I stopped, for I could not bring myself to refer to the 
sword. It was not merely that the subject was too painful : 
of all things I did not want to be cross-questioned by my 
lawyer-companion. 

“It is not amongst those you will find anything of import- 
ance, I suspect. Did your great-grandmother — ^the same, no 
doubt, whose marriage is here registered — leave no letters or 
papers behind her?” 

“ I’ve come upon a few letters. I don’t know if there is 
anything more.” 

“ You haven’t read them, apparently.” 

“ I have not. I’ve been always going to read them, but I 
haven’t opened one of them yet.” 

“ Then I recommend you — that is, if you care for an in- 
teresting piece of family history — ^to read those letters care- 
fully, that is, constructively.” 

“ What do you mean ?” 

“ I mean — putting two and two together, and seeing what 
comes of it; trying to make everything fit into one, you 
know.” 

“Yes. I understand you. But how do you happen to 
know that those letters contain a history, or that it will prove 
interesting when I have found it ?” 

“ All family history ought to be interesting — at least to the 
last of his race,” he returned, replying only to the latter half 
of my question. “ It must, for one thing, make him feel his 
duty to his ancestors more strongly.” 

“ His duty to marry, I suppose you mean ?” I said with 


374 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


some inward bitterness. “ But to tell the truth, I don’t think 
the inheritance worth it, in my case.” 

“ It might be better,” he said, with an expression which 
seemed odd beside the simplicity of the words. 

“ Ah ! you think then to urge me to make money ; and for 
the sake of my dead ancestors increase the inheritance of 
those that may come after me? But I believe I am already 
as diligent as is good for me — that is, in the main, for I have 
been losing time of late.” 

“ I meant no such thing, Mr. Cumbermede. I should be 
very doubtfiil whether any amount of success in literature 
would enable you to restore the fortunes of your family.” 

“Were they so very ponderous, do you think? But in 
truth I have little ambition of that sort. All I will readily 
confess to is a strong desire not to shirk what work falls to my 
share in the world.” 

“Yes,” he said, in a thoughtful manner — “if one only 
knew what his share of the work was.” 

The remark was unexpected, and I began to feel a little 
more interest in him. 

“ Hadn’t you better take a copy of that entry ?” he said. 

“ Yes — perhaps I had. But I have no materials.” 

It did not strike me that attorneys do not usually, like 
excisemen, carry about an ink-bottle, when he drew one from 
the breast-pocket of his coat, along with a folded sheet of 
writing-paper, which he opened and spread out on the desk. 
I took the pen he offered me, and copied the entry. 

When I had finished, he said — 

“ Leave room under it for the attestation of the parson. 
We can get that another time, if necessary. Then write 
under it. 'Copied by me’ — and then your name and the date. 
It may be useful some time. Take it home and lay it with 
your grandmother’s papers.” 

“There can be no harm in that,” I said, as I folded it up, 
and put it in my pocket. “I am greatly obliged to you for 
bringing me here, Mr. Coningham. Though I am not am- 
bitious of restoring the family to a grandeur of which every 


UMBERDEN CHURCH. 


375 


record has departed, I am quite sufficiently interested in its 
history, and shall consequently take care of this document.” 

“ Mind you read your grandmother’s papers, though,” he 
said. 

‘‘ I will,” I answered. 

He replaced the volume on the shelf, and we left the 
church ; he locked the door and replaced the key under the 
gravestone ; we mounted our horses, and after riding with me 
about half the way to the Moat, he took his leave at a point 
where our roads diverged. I resolved to devote that very 
evening, partly in the hope of distracting my thoughts, to the 
reading of my grandmother’s letters. 


376 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE, 


CHAPTER XLVL 

MY FOLIO. 

When I reached home I found Charley there, as I had 
expected. 

But a change had again come over him. He was nervous, 
restless, apparently anxious. I questioned him about his 
mother and sister. He had met them as planned, and had, he 
assured me, done his utmost to impress them with the truth 
concerning me. But he had found his mother incredulous, 
and had been unable to discover from her how much she had 
heard ; while Mary maintained an obstinate silence, and, as he 
said, looked more stupid than usual. He did not tell me that 
Clara had accompanied them so far, and that he had walked 
with her back to the entrance of the park. This I heard 
afterwards. When we had talked a while over the sword- 
business — for we could not well keep off it long— Charley 
seeming all the time more uncomfortable than ever, he said, 
perhaps merely to turn the talk into a more pleasant 
channel — 

“By the way, where have you put your folio? I’ve been 
looking for it ever since I came in, but I can’t find it. A new 
reading started up in my head the other day, and I want to 
try it both with the print and the context.” 

“ It’s in my room,” I answered. “ I will go and fetch it.” 

“We will go together,” he said. 

I Iqol^ed where I thought I had laid it, but there it was not. 
A pang of foreboding terror invaded me. Charley told me 
afterwards that I turned as white as a sheet. I looked every- 
where, but in vain ; ran and searched my uncle’s room, and 
then Charley’s, but still in vain ; and at last, all at once, 
remembered with certainty that two nights before I had laid 
it on the window-sill in my uncle’s room. I shouted for Styles 


MY FOLIO. 


377 


but he was gone home with the mare, and I had to wait, in 
little short of agony, until he returned. The moment he 
entered, I began to question him. 

“ You took those books home. Styles?” I said, as quietly as 
I could, anxious not to startle him, lest it should interfere 
with the just action of his memory. 

“ Yes, sir. I took them at once, and gave them into Miss 
Pease’s own hand ; at least I suppose it was Miss Pease. She 
wasn’t a young lady, sir.” 

“ All right, I dare say. How many were there of them ?” 

“ Six, sir.” 

I told you five,” I said, trembling with apprehension and 
wrath. 

“ You said four or five, and I never thought but the six 
were to go. They were all together on the window-sill.” 

I stood speechless. Charley took up the questioning. 

** What sized books were they ?” he asked. 

“ Pretty biggish — one of them quite a large one — ^the same 
I’ve seen you, gentlemen, more than once putting your heads 
together over. At least it looked like it.” 

Charley started up and began pacing about the room. 
Styles saw he had committed some dreadful mistake, and 
began a blundering expression of regret, but neither of us 
took any notice of him, and he crept out in dismay. 

It was some time before either of us could utter a word. 
The loss of the sword was a trifle to this. Beyond a doubt 
the precious tome was now lying in the library of Mold warp 
Hall — amongst old friends and companions, possibly — where 
years might elapse before one loving hand would open it, or 
any eyes gaze on it with reverence. 

“ Lost, Charley !” I said at last. — Irrecoverably lost !” 

“ I will go and fetch it,” he cried, starting up. “ I will tell 
Clara to bring it out to me. It is beyond endurance this. 
Why should you not go and claim what both of us can take 
our oath to as yours ?” 

“ You forget, Charley, how the sword affair cripples us — 
and how the claiming of this volume would only render their 


378 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


belief with regard to the other the more probable. You 
forget, too, that I might have placed it in the chest first, 
and above all that the name on the title-page is the same 
as the initials on the blade of the sword, — the same as my 
own.” 

‘‘ Yes — I see it won’t do. And yet if I were to represent 
the thing to Sir Giles ? — He doesn't care for old books ” 

“ You forget, again, Charley, that the volume is of great 
money-value. Perhaps my late slip has made me fastidious — 
but though the book be mine — and if I had it, the proof of 
the contrary would lie with them — I could not take advantage 
of Sir Giles’s ignorance to recover it.” 

“ I might, however, get Clara — she is a favorite with him, 
you know ” 

“ I will not hear of it,” I said, interrupting him, and he was 
forced to yield. 

‘‘ No, Charley,” I said again ; ** I must just bear it. Harder 
things have been borne, and men have got through the world 
and out of it notwithstanding. K there isn’t another world, 
why should we care much for the loss of what must go with 
the rest ?— and if there is, why should we care at all ?” 

“ Very fine, Wilfrid ! but when you come to the practice — 
why, the less said the better.” 

“ But that is the very point : we don’t come to the practice. 
If we did, then the ground of it would be proved unobjec- 
tionable.” 

" True ; but if the practice be unattainable ” 

‘‘ It would take much proving to prove that to my — dissatis- 
faction, I should say ; and more failure besides, I can tell you, 
than there will be time for in this world. If it were proved, 
however — don’t you see it would disprove both suppositions 
equally? If such a philosophical spirit be unattainable, it 
discredits both sides of the alternative, on either of which 
would it have been reasonable.” 

“ There is a sophism there, of course, but I am not in the 
mood of pulling your logic to pieces,” returned Charley, still 
pacing up and down the room. 


MY FOLIO. 


379 


In sum, nothing would come of all our talk but the assu- 
rance that the volume was equally irrecoverable with the 
sword, and indeed with my poor character — at least in the eyes 
of my immediate neighbors. 


380 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDB. 


CHAPTER XL'Vli. 

THE LETTERS AND THEIR STORY. 

As soon as Charley went to bed, I betook myself to my 
grandmother’s room, in which, before discovering my loss, I 
had told Styles to kindle a fire. I had said nothing ta Char- 
ley about my ride, and the old church, and the marriage- 
register. For the time, indeed, I had almost lost what small 
interest I had taken in the matter — ^my new bereavement was 
so absorbing and painful ; but feeling certain when he left me 
that I should not be able to sleep, but would be tormented all 
night by innumerable mental mosquitoes if I made the at- 
tempt, and bethinking me of my former resolution, I proceeded 
to carry it out. 

The fire was burning brightly, and my reading lamp was on 
the table, ready to be lighted. But I sat down first in my 
grandmother’s chair and mused for I know not how long. At 
length my wandering thoughts rehearsed again the excursion 
of Mr. Coningham. I pulled the copy of the marriage-entry 
from my pocket, and in reading it over again, my curiosity 
was sufficiently aroused to send me to the bureau. I lighted 
my lamp at last, unlocked what had seemed to my childhood 
a treasury of unknown marvels, took from it the packet of yel- 
low, withered letters, and sat down again by the fire to read, 
in my great-grandmother’s chair, the letters of Wilfrid Cum- 
bermede Daryll — for so he signed himself in all of them — my 
great-grandfather. There were amongst them a few of her 
own in reply to his— badly written and badly spelt, but per- 
fectly intelligible. I will not transcribe any of them— I have 
them to show if needful — but not at my command at the pre- 
sent moment j for I am writing neither where I commenced 
my story — on the outskirts of an ancient city, nor at the 
Moat, but in the dreary old square in London ; and those 


THE LETTEBS AND THEIR STORY. 


381 


letters lie locked again in the old bureau, and have lain un- 
visited through thousands of desolate days and slow creeping 
nights, in that room which I cannot help feeling sometimes as 
if the ghost of that high-spirited, restless-hearted grandmother 
of mine must now and then revisit, sitting in the same old 
chair, and wondering to find how far it has all receded from 
her — wondering also to think what a work she made, through 
her long and weary life, about things that look to her now such 
trifles. 

I do not then transcribe any of the letters, but give, in a con- 
nected form, what seem to me the facts I gathered from them; 
not hesitating to present, where they are required, self-evident 
conclusions as if they were facts mentioned in them. I repeat 
that none of my names are real, although they all point at 
the real names. 

Wilfrid Cumbermede was the second son of Richard and 
Mary Daryll of Moldwarp Hall. He was baptized Cumber- 
mede from the desire to keep in memory the name of a 
celebrated ancestor, the owner in fact of the disputed sword — 
itself alluded to in the letters, — who had been more mindful 
of the supposed rights of his king than the next king was of 
the privations undergone for his sake, for Moldwarp Hall at 
least was never recovered from the roundhead branch of the 
family into whose possession it had drifted. In the change, 
however, which creeps on with new generations, there had 
been in the family a reaction of sentiment in favor of the more 
distinguished of its progenitors ; and Richard Daryll, a man 
of fierce temper and overbearing disposition, had named his 
son after the cavalier. A tyrant in his family, at least in the 
judgment of the writers of those letters, he apparently found 
no trouble either with his wife or his eldest or youngest son ; 
while, whether his own fault or not, it was very evident that 
from Wilfrid his annoyances had been numerous. 

A legal feud had for some time existed between the Ahab 
of Moldwarp Hall and the Naboth of the Moat, the descen- 
dant of an ancient yeoman family of good blood, and indeed 
related to the Darylls themselves, of the name of WoodruflTe. 


382 


WILFRID CUMBEEMEDE. 


Sir Richard had cast covetous eyes upon the field surrounding 
Stephen’s comparatively humble abode, which had at one time 
formed a part of the Moldwarp property. In searching through 
some old parchments, he had found, or rather, I suppose, per- 
suaded himself he had found sufficient evidence that this part 
of the property of the Moat, then of considerable size, had 
been willed away in contempt of the entail which covered it, 
and belonged by right to himself and his heirs. He had 
therefore instituted proceedings to recover possession, during 
the progress of which their usual bickerings and disputes aug- 
mented in fierceness. A decision having at length been given in 
favor of the weaker party, the mortification of Sir Richard was 
unendurable to himself, and his wrath and unreasonableness, 
in consequence, equally unendurable to his family. One may 
then imagine the paroxysm of rage with which he was seized 
when he discovered that, during the whole of the legal process, 
his son Wilfrid had been making love to Elizabeth Woodrufie, 
the only child of his enemy. In Wilfrid’s letters, the part of 
the story which follows is fully detailed for Elizabeth’s infor- 
mation, of which the reason is also plain — ^that the writer had 
spent such a brief period afterwards in Elizabeth’s society, 
that he had not been able for very shame to recount the 
particulars. 

No sooner had Sir Richard come to a knowledge of the 
hateful fact, evidently through one of his servants, than sup- 
pressing the outburst of his rage for the moment, he sent for 
his son Wilfrid, and informed him, his lips quivering with sup- 
pressed passion, of the discovery he had made ; accused him of 
having brought disgrace on the family, and of having been 
guilty of falsehood and treachery; and ordered him to go 
down on his knees and abjure the girl before heaven, or expect 
a father’s vengeance. 

But evidently Wilfrid was as little likely as any man to 
obey such a command. He boldly avowed his love for Eliza- 
beth, and declared his intention of marrying her. His father, 
foaming with rage, ordered his servants to seize him. Over- 
mastered in spite of his struggles, he bound him to a pillar. 


THE LETTERS AND THEIR STORY. 


383 


and taking a horse-whip, lashed him furiously ; then, after his 
rage was thus in a measure appeased, ordered them to carry 
him to his bed. There he remained, hardly able to move, the 
whole of that night and the next day. On the following night 
he made his escape from the Hall, and took refuge with a far- 
mer-fi-iend a few miles off — in the neighborhood, probably of 
Umberden church. 

Here I would suggest a conjecture of my own — namely, 
that my ancestor’s room was the same I had occupied, so — 
fatally, shall I say ? — to myself, on the only two occasions on 
which I had slept at the Hall ; that he escaped by the stair to 
the roof, having first removed the tapestry from the door, as 
a memorial to himself, and a sign to those he left ; that he 
carried with him the sword and the volume — ^both probably 
lying in his room at the time, and the latter little valued by 
any other. But all this, I repeat, is pure conjecture. 

As soon as he was sufficiently recovered, he communicated 
with Elizabeth, prevailed upon her to marry him at once at 
Umberden church, and within a few days, as near as I could 
judge, left her to join, as a volunteer, the army of the Duke 
of Cumberland, then fighting the French in the Netherlands. 
Probably, from the morbid fear lest the disgrace his father’s 
brutality had inflicted should become known in his regiment, 
he dropped the surname of Daryll when he joined it ; and — 
for what precise reasons I cannot be certain — ^his wife evident- 
ly never called herself by any other name than Cumbermede. 
Very likely she kept her marriage a secret, save from her own 
family, until the birth of my grandfather, which certainly 
took place before her husband’s return. Indeed I am almost 
sure that he never returned from that campaign, but died 
fighting, not unlikely at the battle of Lafteldt ; and that my 
grannie’s letters, which I found in the same pocket, had been, 
by the kindness of some comrade, restored to the young widow. 

When I had finished reading the letters, and had again 
thrown myself back in the old chair, I began to wonder why 
nothing of all this should ever have been told me. That the 
whole history should have dropped out of the knowledge of 


384 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


the family would have been natural enough, had my great- 
grandmother, as well as my great-grandfather, died in youth ; 
but that she should have outlived her son, dying only after I, 
the representative of the fourth generation, was a boy at school, 
and yet no whisper have reached me of these facts, appeared 
strange. A moment’s reflection showed me that the causes and 
the reasons of the fact must have lain with my uncle. I could 
not but remember how both he and my aunt had sought to 
prevent me from seeing my grannie alone, and how the last 
had complained of this in terms far more comprehensible to 
me now than they were then. But what could have been the 
reasons for this their obstruction of the natural flow of tradi- 
tion ? They remained wrapt in a mystery which the outburst 
from it of an occasional gleam of congenial light only served 
to deepen. 

The letters lying open on the table before me, my eyes 
rested upon one of the dates — the third day of March, 1747. 
It struck me that this date involved a discrepancy with that 
of the copy, I had made from the register. I referred to it, 
and found my suspicion correct. According to the copy, my 
ancestors were not married until the 15th of January, 1748. 
I must have made a blunder — and yet I could hardly believe 
I had, for I had reason to consider myself accurate. If these 
was no mistake, I should have to reconstruct my facts, and 
draw fresh conclusions. 

By this time, however, I was getting tired and sleepy and 
cold ; my lamp was nearly out ; my fire was quite gone ; and 
the first of a frosty dawn was beginning to break in the east. 
I rose and replaced the papers, reserving all further thought on 
the matter for a condition of circumstances more favorable to 
a correct judgment. I blew out the lamp, groped my way to 
bed in the dark, and was soon fast asleep, in despite of insult, 
mortification, perplexity and loss. 


ONLY A LINK. 


385 


CHAPTER XLVIIL 

ONLY A LINK. 

It may be said of the body in regard of sleep as well as in 
regard of death, “ It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power.’’ 
For me, the next morning, I could almost have said, “ I was 
sown in dishonor and raised in glory.” No one can deny the 
power of the wearied body to paralyze the soul ; but I have a 
correlate theory which I love, and which I expect to find true 
that, while the body wearies the mind, it is the mind that 
restores vigor to the body, and then, like the man who has 
built him a stately palace, rejoices to dwell in it. I believe 
that, if there be a living, conscious love at the heart of the 
universe, the mind, in the quiescence of its consciousness in 
sleep, comes into a less disturbed contact with its origin, the 
heart of the creation ; whence, gifted with calmness and strength 
for itself, it grows able to impart comfort and restoration to the 
weary frame. The cessation of labor afibrds but the necessary 
occasion ; makes it possible, as it were, for the occupant of an 
outlying station in the wilderness to return to his father’s house 
for fresh supplies of all that is needful for life and energy. 
The child-soul goes home at night, and returns in the morning 
to the labors of the school. Mere physical rest could never of 
its own negative self build up the frame in such light and vigor 
as come through sleep. 

It was from no blessed vision that I woke the next morning, 
but from a deep and dreamless sleep. Yet the moment I be- 
came aware of myself and the world, I felt strong and coura- 
geous, and I began at once to look my affairs in the face. Con- 
cerning that which was first in consequence, I soon satisfied 
myself: I could not see that I had committed any serious fault 
in the whole affair. I was not at all sure that a lie in defence 
of the innocent, and to prevent the knowledge of what no one 
25 


386 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


had any right to know, was wrong — seeing such involves no 
injustice on the one side, and does justice on the other. I have 
seen reason since to change my mind, and count my liberty 
restricted to silence — not extending, that is, to the denial or 
assertion of what the will of God, inasmuch as it exists or does 
not exist, may have declared to be or not to be fact. I now 
think that to lie is, as it were, to snatch the reins out of God’s 
hand. 

At all events, however, I had done the Brothertons no 
wrong. 

“ What matter, then,” I said to myself, of what they be- 
lieve me guilty, so long as before God and my own conscience 
I am clear and clean ?” 

Next came the practical part : — What was I to do ? To right 
myself, either in respect of their opinion or in respect of my 
lost property, was more hopeless than important, and I hardly 
wasted two thoughts upon that. But I could not remain 
where I was, and soon came to the resolution to go with Char- 
ley to London at once, and taking lodgings in some secure 
recess near the inns of court, there to give myself to work, and 
work alone, in the foolish hope that one day fame might but- 
tress reputation. In this resolution I was more influenced by 
the desire to be near the brother of Mary Osborne, than the 
desire to be near my friend Charley, strong as that was ; I ex- 
pected thus to hear of her oftener, and even cherished the hope 
of coming to hear from her — of inducing her to honor me with 
a word or two of immediate communication. For I could see 
no reason why her opinions should prevent her from corre- 
sponding with one who, whatever might or might not seem to 
him true, yet cared for the truth, and must treat with respect 
every form in which he could descry its predominating pre- 
sence. 

I would have asked Charley to set out with me that very 
day, but for the desire to clear up the discrepancy between the 
date of my ancestor’s letters, all written within the same year, 
and that of the copy I had made of the registration of their 
marriage — with which object I would compare the copy and the 


ONLY A LINK. 


387 


original. I wished also to have some talk with Mr. Coningham 
concerning the contents of the letters which at his urgency I 
had now read. I got up and wrote to him therefore, asking 
him to ride with me again to Umberden Church as soon as he 
could make it convenient, and sent Styles off at once on the 
mare to carry the note to Miustercombe and bring me back an 
answer. 

As we sat over our breakfast, Charley said suddenly, 

** Clara was regretting yesterday that she had not seen the 
Moat. She said you had asked her once, but had never spoken 
of it again.” 

“ And now I suppose she thinks, because I’m in disgrace with 
her friends at the Hall, that she mustn’t come near me,” I said, 
with another bitterness than belonged to the words. 

“ Wilfrid !” he said reproachfully ; she didn’t say anything 
of the sort. I will write and ask her if she couldn’t contrive 
to come over. She might meet us at the park gates.” 

“No,” I returned; “there isn’t time. I mean to go back to 
London — perhaps to-morrow evening. It is like turning you 
out, Charley, but we shall be nearer each other in town than 
we were last time.” 

“ I am delighted to hear it,” he said. “ I had been thinking 
myself that I had better go back this evening. My father is 
expected home in a day or two, and it would be just like him 
to steal a march on my chambers. Yes, I think I shall go 
to-night.” 

“Very well, old boy,” I answered. “That will make it all 
right. It’s a pity we couldn’t take the journey together, but it 
doesn’t matter much. I shall follow you as soon as I can.” 

“ Why can’t you go with me ?” he asked. 

Thereupon I gave him a full report of my excursion with 
Mr. Coningham, and the after-reading of my letters, with my 
reason for wishing to examine the register again ; telling him 
that I had asked Mr. Coningham to ride with me once more to 
Umberden Church. 

When Styles returned, he informed me that Mr. Couingham 
at first proposed to ride back with him, but probably bethink' 


888 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


ing himself that another sixteen miles would be too much for 
my mare, had changed his mind and sent me the message that 
he would be with me early the next day. 

After Charley was gone, I spent the evening in a thorough 
search of the old bureau. I found in it several quaint orna- 
ments besides those already mentioned, but only one thing 
which any relation to my story would justify specific mention 
of — namely, an ivory label, discolored with age, on which was 
traceable the very number Sir Giles had read from the scab- 
bard of Sir Wilfrid’s sword. Clearly then my sword was the 
one mentioned in the book, and as clearly it had not been at 
Moldwarp Hall for a long time before I lost it there. If I 
were in any fear as to my reader’s acceptance of my story, I 
should rejoice in the possession of that label more than in the 
restoration of sword or book; but amidst all my troubles, I 
have as yet been able to rely upon her justice and her know- 
ledge of myself. Yes, I must mention one thing more I found ; 
a long, sharp-pointed, straight-backed, snake-edged Indian 
dagger, inlaid with silver — a fierce, dangerous, almost venom- 
ous-looking weapon, in a curious case of old green morocco. It 
also may have once belonged to the armory of Moldwarp Hall. 
I took it with me when I left my grannie’s room, and laid it 
in the portmanteau I was going to take to London. 

My only difficulty was what to do with Lilith ; but I resolved 
for the mean time to leave her, as before, in the care of Styles, 
who seemed almost as fond of her as I was myselfi 


A DISCLOSURE. 


389 


CHAPTER XLIX. 

A DISCLOSURE. 

Mr. Coningham was at my door by ten o’clock, and we set 
out together for Umberden Church. It was a cold, clear 
morning. The dying autumn was turning a bright, thin, de- 
fiant face upon the conquering winter. I was in great spirits, 
my mind being full of Mary Osborne. At one moment I saw 
but her own ordinary face, only, what I had used to regard as 
dullness I now interpreted as the possession of her soul in 
patience ; at another I saw the glorified countenance of my 
Atha7ia8ia, knowing that beneath the veil of the other, this, 
the real, the true face ever lay. Once in my sight, the frost- 
clung fiower had blossomed ; in fiill ideal of glory it had shone 
for a moment, and then, folding itself again away, had retired 
into the regions of faith. And while I knew that such could 
dawn out of such, how could I help hoping that from the face 
of the universe, however to my eyes it might sometimes seem 
to stare like the seven-days dead, one morn might dawn the 
unspeakable face which even Moses might not behold lest he 
should die of the great sight ? The keen air, the bright sun- 
shine, the swift motion — all combined to raise my spirits to an 
unwonted pitch ; but it was a silent ecstasy, and I almost for- 
got the presence of Mr. Coningham. When he spoke at last, 
I started. 

“ I thought from yonr letter you had something to tell me, 
Mr. Cumbermede,” he said, coming alongside of me. 

Yes, to be sure. I have been reading my grannie’s papers^ 
as I told you.” 

I recounted the substance of what I had found in them. 

“ Does it not strike you as rather strange that all this should 
have been kept a secret from you ?” he asked. 


390 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Very few know anything about their grandfathers,” I said; 
“ so I suppose very few fathers care to tell their children about 
them.” 

“ That is because there are so few concerning whom there is 
anything worth telling.” 

“ For my part,” I returned, “ I should think any fact con- 
cerning one of those who link me with the infinite past out of 
which I have come, invaluable. Even a fact which is not to 
the credit of an ancestor may be a precious discovery to the 
man who has in himself to fight the evil derived from it.” 

“ That, however, is a point of view rarely taken. What the 
ordinary man values is also rare ; hence few regard their an- 
cestry, or transmit any knowledge they may have of those who 
have gone before them to those that come after them.” 

“ My uncle, however, I suppose, told me nothing because, 
unlike the many, he prized neither wealth nor rank ; nor what 
are commonly considered great deeds.” 

“ You are not far from the truth there,” said Mr. Coningham 
in a significant tone. 

“ Then you know why he never told me anything !” I ex- 
claimed. 

“ I do — from the best authority.” 

“ His own, you mean, I suppose.” 

“ I do.” 

‘‘ But — ^but — I didn’t know you were ever — at all — ^intimate 
with my uncle,” I said. 

He laughed knowingly. 

“ You would say, if you didn’t mind speaking the truth, 
that you thought your uncle disliked me — disapproved of me. 
Come now — did he not try to make you avoid me? You 
needn’t mind acknowledging the fact, for when X have ex- 
plained the reason of it, you will see that it involves no dis- 
credit to either of us.” 

“ 1 have no fear for my uncle.” 

“ You are honest, if not over polite,” he rejoined. “ You 
do not feel so sure about my share. Well, I don’t mind who 
knows it, for my part. I roused the repugnance, to the 


A DISCLOSURE. 


391 


knowledge of which your silence, confesses, merely by acting 
as any professional man ought to have acted — and with the 
best intentions. At the same time, all the blame I should 
ever think of casting upon him is, that he allowed his high- 
strung, saintly, I had almost said superhuman ideas to stand 
in the way of his nephew’s prosperity.” 

Perhaps he was afraid of that prosperity standing in the 
way of a better.” 

‘‘ Precisely so. You understand him perfectly. He was one 
of the best and simplest-minded men in the world.” 

“ I am glad you do him that justice.” 

“ At the same time I do not think he intended you to remain 
in absolute ignorance of what I am going to tell you. But 
you see, he died very suddenly. Besides, he could hardly 
expect I should hold my tongue after he was gone.” 

‘‘Perhaps, however, he might expect me not to cultivate 
your acquaintance,” I said, laughing to take the sting out of 
the words. 

“You cannot accuse yourself of having taken any trouble 
in that direction,” he returned, laughing also. 

“I believe, however,” I resumed, “from what I can recall of 
things he said, especially on one occasion on which he acknowl- 
edged the existence of a secret in which I was interested, he 
did not intend that I should always remain in ignorance of 
ever3rthing he thought proper to conceal from me then.” 

“I presume you are right. I think his conduct in this 
respect arose chiefly from anxiety that the formation of 
your character should not be influenced by the knowledge of 
certain facts which might unsettle you, and prevent you from 
reaping the due advantages of study and self-dependence in 
youth. I cannot, however, believe that by being open with 
you I shall now be in danger of thwarting his plans, for you 
have already proved yourself a wise, moderate, conscientious 
man, diligent and pains-taking. Forgive me for appearing to 
praise you. I had no such intention. I was only uttering as 
a fact to be considered in the question, what upon my honor I 
thoroughly believe.” 


392 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I should be happy in your good opinion, if I were able to 
appropriate it,’^ I said. “ But a man knows his own faults 
better than his neighbor knows his virtues.’^ 

“ Spoken like the man I took you for, Mr. Cumbermede,” 
he rejoined gravely. 

“ But to return to the matter in hand,” I resumed : “ what 
can there be so dangerous in the few facts I have just come to 
the knowledge of, that my uncle should have cared to conceal 
them from me ? That a man bom in humble circumstances 
should come to know that he had distinguished ancestors, 
could hardly so fill him with false notions as to endanger his 
relation to the laws of his existence.” 

“ Of course — but you are too hasty. Those facts are of 
more importance than you are aware — involve other facts. 
Moldwarp Hall is your property, and not Sir Giles Bro- 
therton’s.” 

“ Then the apple was my own, after all !” I said to myself 
exultingly. It was a strange fantastic birth of conscience and 
memory, — forgotten the same moment, and followed by an 
electric flash — not of hope, not of delight, not of pride, but of 
pure revenge. My whole frame quivered with the shock ; yet 
for a moment I seemed to have the strength of a Hercules. 
In front of me was a stile through a high hedge : I turned 
Lilith’s head to the hedge, struck my spurs into her, and over 
or through it, I know not which, she bounded. Already, with 
all the strength of will I could summon, I struggled to rid 
myself of the wicked feeling ; and although I cannot pretend 
to have succeeded for long after, yet by the time Mr. Coning- 
ham had popped over the stile, I was waiting for him, to all 
appearance, I believe, perfectly calm. He on the other hand, 
from whatever cause, was actually trembling. His face was 
pale, and his eye flashing. Was it that he had roused me 
more effectually than he had hoped ? 

‘‘ Take care, take care, my boy,” he said, “ or you won’t live 
to enjoy your own. Permit me the honor of shaking hands 
with Sir Wilfrid Cumbermede Daryll.” 

After this ceremonial of prophetic investiture we jogged 


A DISCLOSURE. 


393 


away quietly, and he told me a long story about the death of 
the last proprietor, the degree in which Sir Giles was related 
to him, and his undisputed accession to the property. At 
that time, he said, my father was in very bad health, and 
indeed died within six months of it. 

I knew your father well, Mr. Cumbermede,” he went on, 
“ — one of the best of men, with more spirit — more ambition 
than your uncle. It was his wish that his child, if a boy, 
should be called Wilfrid — for though they had been married 
five or six years, their only child was born after his death. 
Your uncle did not like the name, your mother told me, but 
made no objection to it. So you were named after your grand- 
father, and great-grandfather, and I don’t know how many of 
the race besides. — When the last of the Darylls died — ” 

“ Then,” I interrupted, “ my father was the heir.” 

“ No ; you mistake : your uncle was the elder — Sir David 
Cumbermede Daryll, of Moldwarp Hall, and the Moat,” said 
Mr, Coningham, evidently bent on making the most of my 
rights. 

“ He never even told me he was the eldest,” I said. ‘‘ I 
always thought, from his coming home to manage the farm 
when my father was HI, that he was the second of the two 
sons.” 

“ On the contrary, he was several years older than your 
father — so that you mustn’t suppose that he kept you back from 
any of your rights. They were his, not yours, while he lived.” 

“ I will not ask,” I said, “ why he did not enforce them. 
That is plain enough from what I know of his character. The 
more I think of that, the loftier and simpler it seems to grow. 
He could not bring himself to spend the energies of a soul 
meant for higher things on the assertion and recovery of 
earthly rights.” 

“ I rather differ from you there ; and I do not know,” re- 
turned my companion, whose tone was far more serious than I 
had ever heard it before, “ whether the explanation I am going 
to offer will raise your uncle as much in your estimation as it 
does in mine. I confess I do not rank such self-denial as you 


394 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


attribute to him so highly as you do. On the contrary, I 
count it a fault. How could the world go on if everybody 
was like your uncle V* 

“ If everybody was like my uncle, he would have been 
forced to accept the position,” I said ; “ for there would have 
been no one to take it from him.” 

“ Perhaps. But you must not think Sir Giles knew any- 
thing of your uncle’s claim. He knows nothing of it now.” 

I had not thought of Sir Giles in connection with the 
matter — only of Geoffrey ; and my heart recoiled from the 
notion of dispossessing the old man, who, however misled with 
regard to me at last, had up till then shown me uniform kind- 
ness. In that moment I had almost resolved on taking no 
steps till after his death. But Mr, Coningham soon made me 
forget Sir Giles in a fresh revelation of my uncle. 

“ Although,” he resumed, “ all you say of your uncle’s indif- 
ference to this world and its affairs is indubitably correct, I do 
not believe, had there not been a prospect of your making your 
appearance, that he would have shirked the duty of occupying 
the property which was his both by law and nature. But he 
knew it might be an expensive suit — for no one can tell by 
what tricks of the law such may be prolonged — in which case 
all the money he could command would soon be spent, and 
nothing left either to provide for your so-called aunt, for whom 
he had a great regard, or to give you that education which, 
whether you were to succeed to the property or not, he counted 
indispensable. He cared far more, he said, about your having 
such a property in yourself as was at once personal and real, 
than for you having any amount of property out of yourself. 
Expostulation was of no use. I had previously learned — from 
the old lady herself — ^the true state of the case, and, upon the 
death of Sir Geoffrey Daryll, had at once communicated with 
him — which placed me in a position for urging him, as I did 
again and again, considerably to his irritation, to assert and 
prosecute his claim to the title and estates. I offered to take 
the whole risk upon myself ; but he said that would be tanta- 
mount to giving up his personal liberty, until the matter was 


A DISCLOSURE. 


395 


settled, which might not be in his lifetime. I may just 
mention, however, that besides his religious absorption, I 
strongly suspect there was another cause of his indifference to 
worldly affairs : I have grounds for thinking that he was dis- 
appointed in a more than ordinary attachment to a lady he 
met at Oxford — in station considerably above any prospects 
he had then. To return : he was resolved that whatever might 
be your fate, you should not have to meet it without such pre- 
paration as he could afford you. As you have divined, he was 
most anxious that your character should have acquired some 
degree of firmness before you knew anything of the possibility 
of your inheriting a large property and historical name ; and 
I may appropriate the credit of a negative share in the car- 
rying out of his plans, for you will bear me witness how often 
I might have upset them by informing you of the facts of the 
case.’^ 

“ I am heartily obliged to you,” I said, “ for not interfering 
with my uncle’s wishes, for I am very glad indeed that I have 
been kept in ignorance of my rights until now. The know- 
ledge would at one time nave gone far to render me useless 
for personal effort in any direction worthy of it. It would 
have made me conceited, ambitious, boastful : I don’t know 
how many bad adjectives would have been necessary to 
describe me.” 

“ It is all very well to be modest, but I venture to think 
differently.” 

** I should like to ask you one question, Mr. Coningham,” I 
said. 

“ As many as you please.” 

“ How is it that you have so long delayed giving me the 
information which on my uncle’s death you no doubt felt at 
liberty to communicate?” 

“ I did not know how far you might partake of your uncle’s 
disposition, and judged that the wider your knowledge of the 
world, and the juster your estimate of the value of money 
and position, the more willing you would be to listen to the 
proposals I had to make.” 


396 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Do you remember,” I asked, after a canter, led off by my 
companion, “one very stormy night on which you suddenly 
appeared at the Moat, and had a long talk with my uncle on 
the subject ?” 

“ Perfectly,” he answered. “ But how did you come to 
know? He did not tell of my visit !” 

“Certainly not. But, listening in my night-gown on the 
stair, which is open to the kitchen, I heard enough of your 
talk to learn the object of your visit — namely, to carry off my 
skin to make bagpipes with.” 

He laughed so heartily that I told him the whole story of 
the pendulum. 

“On that occasion,” he said, “I made the offer to your 
uncle, on condition of his sanctioning the commencement of 
legal proceedings, to pledge myself to meet every expense of 
your education as well, and to claim nothing whatever in 
return, except in case of success.” 

This quite corresponded with my own childish recollections 
of the interview between them. Indeed there was such an air 
of simple straightforwardness about his whole communication, 
while at the same time it accounted so thoroughly for the 
warning my uncle had given me against him, that I felt I 
might trust him entirely, and so would have told him all that 
had taken place at the Hall, but for the share his daughter 
had borne in it, and the danger of discovery to Mary. 


TUE DATES. 


397 


CHAPTER L. 

THE DATES. 

I HAVE given, of course, only an epitome of our conversa- 
tion, and by the time we had arrived at this point, we had also 
reached the gate of the churchyard. Again we fastened up 
our horses ; again he took the key from under the tomb-stone ; 
and once more we entered the dreary little church, and drew 
aside the curtain of the vestry. I took down the volume of 
the register. The place was easy to find, seeing, as I have 
said, it was at the very end of the volume. 

The copy I had taken was correct ; the date of the marriage 
in the register was January 15, and it was the first under the 
year 1748, written at the top of the page. I stood for a 
moment gazing at it ; then my eye turned to the entry before 
it, the last on the preceding page. It bore the date December 
13 — under the general date at the top of the page, 1747. The 
next entry after it was dated March 29. At the bottom of 
the page, or cover rather, was the attestation of the clergyman 
to the number of marriages in that year ; but there was no 
such attestation at the bottom of the preceding page. I 
turned to Mr. Coningham, who had stood regarding me, and, 
pointing to the book, said — 

“Look here, Mr. Coningham. I cannot understand it. 
Here the date of the marriage is 1748 ; and that of all their 
letters, evidently written after the marriage, is 1747.” 

He looked, and stood looking, but made no reply. In my 
turn I looked at him. His face expressed something not far 
from consternation ; but the moment he became aware that I 
was observing him, he pulled out his handkerchief, and wiping 
his forehead with an attempt at a laugh, said — 

“ How hot it is I Yes ; there is something awkward there. 
I hadn’t observed it before. I must inquire into that. I 


398 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


confess I cannot explain it all at once. It does certainly seem 
queer. I must look into those dates when I go home.” 

He was evidently much more discomposed than he was 
willing I should perceive. He always spoke rather hurriedly, 
but I had never heard him stammer before. I was certain 
that he saw or at least dreaded something fatal in the discre- 
pancy I had pointed out. As to looking into it when he got 
home, that sounded very like nonsense. He pulled out a note- 
book, however, and said : 

“ I may just as well make a note of the blunder — for blun- 
der it must be — a very awkward one indeed, I am afraid. I 
should think so — I cannot — But then — ” 

He went on uttering disjointed and unfinished expressions, 
while he made several notes. His manner was of one who 
regards the action he is about as useless, yet would have it 
supposed the right thing to do. 

“ There !” he said, shutting up his note-book with a slam ; 
and turning away he strode out of the place — much, it seemed 
to me, as if his business there was over forever. I gave one 
more glance at the volume, and replaced it on the shelf. 
When I rejoined him, he was already mounted and turning to 
move ofi*. 

“Wait a moment, Mr. Coningham,” I said. “I don’t 
exactly know where to put the key.” 

“ Fling it imder the grave-stone, and come along,” he said, 
muttering something more, in which perhaps I only fancied 1 
heard certain well-known maledictions. 

By this time my spirits had sunk as much below their 
natural level, as, a little before, they had risen above it. But 
I felt that I must be myself, and that no evil any more than 
good fortune ought for a moment to perturb the tenor of my 
being. Therefore, having locked the door deliberately and 
carefully, I felt about along the underside of the grave-stone 
until I found the ledge where the key had lain. I then made 
what haste I could to mount and follow Mr. Coningham, but 
Lilith delayed the operation by her eagerness. I gave her the 
rein, and it was well that no one happened to be coming in the 


THE DATES. 


399 


opposite direction through that narrow and tortuous passage, 
for she flew round the corners — “ turning close to the ground, 
like a cat when scratchingly she wheels about after a mouse,” 
as my old favorite Sir Philip Sidney says. Notwithstanding 
her speed, however, when I reached the mouth of the lane, 
there was Mr. Coningham half across the first field, with his 
coat-tails flying out behind him. I would not allow myself to 
be left in such a discourteous fashion, and gave chase. Before 
he had measured the other half of the field I was up with 
him. 

That mare of yours is a clever one,” he said, as I ranged 
alongside of him. “ I thought I would give her a breather. 
She hasn’t enough to do.” 

“ She’s not breathing so very fast,” I returned. “ Her wind 
is as good as her legs.” 

“ Let’s go along then, for I’ve lost a great deal of time this 
morning. I ought to have been at Squire Strode’s an hour ago. 
How hot the sun is, to be sure, for this time of the year ?” 

As he spoke he urged his horse, but I took and kept the 
lead, feeling, I confess, a little angry, for I could not help sus- 
pecting he had really wanted to run away from me. I did 
what I could, however, to behave as if nothing had happened. 
But he was very silent, and his manner towards me was quite 
altered. Neither could I help thinking it scarcely worthy of 
a man of the world, not to say a lawyer, to show himself so 
much chagrined. For my part, having simply concluded that 
the new-blown bubble-hope had burst, I found myself just 
where I was before — with a bend sinister on my scutcheon, it 
might be, but with a good conscience, a tolerably clear brain, 
and the dream of my Athanasia. 

The moment we reached the road, Mr. Coningham an- 
nounced that his was in the opposite direction to mine, said 
his good-morning, shook hands with me, and jogged slowly 
away. I knew that was not the nearest way to Squire 
Strode’s. 

I could not help laughing — ^he had so much the look of a 
dog with his tail between his legs, or a beast of prey that had 


400 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


made his spring and missed his game. I watched him for 
some time, for Lilith being pulled both ways — towards home, 
and after her late companion — was tolerably quiescent, but he 
never cast a glance behind him. When at length a curve in 
the road hid him from my sight, I turned and went quietly 
home, thinking what the significance of the unwelcome dis- 
covery might be. If the entry of the marriage under that 
date could not be proved a mere blunder, of which I could see 
no hope, then certainly my grandfather must be regarded as 
born out of wedlock, a supposition which, if correct, would 
account for the dropping of the DaryU. 

On the way home, I jumped no hedges. 

Having taken my farewell of Lilith, I packed my bag of 
needments,” locked the door of my uncle’s room, which I 
would have no one enter in my absence, and set out to meet 
the night-maiL 


CHARLEY AND CLARA. 


401 


CHAPTER LI. 

CHARLEY AND CLARA. 

On my arrival in London I found Charley waiting for me^ 
as I had expected ; and with his help soon succeeded in find- 
ing, in one of the streets leading from the Strand to the river, 
the accommodation I wanted. There I settled, and resumed 
the labor so long and thanklessly interrupted. 

When I recounted the circumstances of my last interview 
with Mr. Coningham, Charley did not seem so much sur- 
prised at the prospect which had opened before me as disap- 
pointed at its sudden close, and would not admit that the 
matter could be allowed to rest where it was. 

“ Do you think the change of style could possibly have 
anything to do with it ?” he asked, after a meditative silence. 

“ I don’t know,” I replied. “ What change of style do you 
mean ?” 

“I mean the change of the beginning of the year from 
March to January,” he answered. 

“ When did that take place?” I asked. 

‘‘Some time about the middle of the last century,” he 
replied ; “ but I will find out exactly.” 

The next night he brought me the information that the 
January which according to the old style would have been 
that of 1752, was promoted to be the first month of the year 
1753. 

My dates then were, by several years, antecedent to the 
change, and it was an indisputable anachronism that the 
January between the December of 1747 and the March of 
1748 should be entered as belonging to the latter year. This 
seemed to throw a little dubious light upon the perplexity : 
the January thus entered belonged clearly to 1747, and there- 
fore was the same January with that of my ancestors’ letters. 

26 


402 


WILFKID CUMBEKMEDE. 


Plainly, however, the entry could not stand in evidence, its in- 
terpolation at least appearing indubitable, for how otherwise 
could it stand at the beginning of the new year instead ot 
towards the end of the old, five years before the change of 
style ? Also, I now clearly remembered that it did look a 
little crushed between the heading of the year and the next 
entry. It must be a forgery — and a stupid one as well, seeing 
the bottom of the preceding page, where there was a small 
blank, would have been the proper place to choose for it — 
that is, under the heading 1747. Could the 1748 have been 
inserted afterwards ? That did not appear likely, seeing it be- 
longed to all the rest of the entries on the page, there being 
none between the date in question and March 29, on the 25th 
of which month the new year began. The conclusion lying 
at the door was, that some one had inserted the marriage so 
long after the change of style that he knew nothing of the 
trap there lying for his forgery. It seemed probable that, 
blindly following the letters, he had sought to place it in the 
beginning of the previous year, but, getting bewildered in the 
apparent eccentricities of the arrangement of month and year, 
or, perhaps finding no other blank suitable to his purpose, had 
at last drawn his bow at a venture. Neither this nor any other 
theory I could fashion, did I however find in the least satis- 
fectory. All I could be sure of was, that here was no evidence 
of the marriage — on the contrary, a strong presumption 
against it. 

For my part, the dream in which I had indulged had been 
so short that I very soon recovered from the disappointment 
of the waking therefrom. Neither did the blot with which 
the birth of my grandfather was menaced affect me much. 
My chief annoyance in regard of that aspect of the affair 
was in being so related to Geoffrey Brotherton. 

I cannot say how it came about, but I could not help ob- 
serving that, by degrees, a manifest softening appeared in 
Charley’s mode of speaking of his father, although I knew 
that there was not the least approach to a more cordial inter- 
course between them. I attributed the change to the letters 


CHARLEY AND CLARA. 


403 


of his sister, which he always gave me to read. From them I 
have since classed her with a few others I have since known, 
chiefly women, the best of their kind, so good and so large- 
minded that they seem ever on the point of casting aside the 
unworthy opinions they have been taught, and showing them- 
selves the true followers of him who cared only for the truth ; 
and yet holding by the doctrines of men, and believing them 
to be the mind of God. 

In one or two of Charley’s letters to her I ventured to 
insert a question or two, and her reference to these in her 
replies to Charley gave me an opportunity of venturing to 
write to her more immediately, in part defending what I 
thought the truth, in part expressing all the sympathy I 
honestly could with her opinions. She replied very kindly, 
very earnestly, and with a dignity of expression as well as of 
thought which harmonized entirely with my vision of her 
deeper and grander nature. 

The chief bent of my energies was now to vindicate for 
myself a worthy position in the world of letters; but my 
cherished hope lay in the growth of such an intimacy with 
Mary Osborne as might afford ground for the cultivation of 
fer higher and more precious ambitions. 

. It was not, however, with the design of fiirthering these 
that I was now guilty of what will seem to most men a 
Quixotic action enough. 

“Your sister is fond of riding — is she not?” I asked 
Charley one day, as we sauntered with our cigars on the ter- 
race of the Adelphi. 

“ As fond as one can possibly be who has had so little op- 
portunity,” he said. 

“ I was hoping to have a ride with her and Clara the very 
evening when that miserable affair occurred. The loss of that 
ride was at least as great a disappointment to me as the loss 
of the sword.” 

“ You seem to like my sister, Wilfrid,” he said. 

“At least I care more for her good opinion than I do for 
any woman’s — or man’s either, Charley.” 


404 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I am SO glad !” he responded. ‘‘You like her better than 
Clara, then ?” 

“ Ever so much,” I said. 

He looked more pleased than annoyed, I thought — certainly 
neither the one nor the other entirely. His eyes sparkled, 
but there was a flicker of darkness about his forehead. 

“ I am very glad,” he said again, after a moment’s pause. 
“I thought — I was afraid— I had fancied sometimes — you 
were still a little in love with Clara.” 

“Not one atom,” I returned. “She cured me of that quite. 
There is no danger of that any more,” I added — foolishly, 
seeing I intended no explanation. 

“ How do you mean ?” he asked, a little uneasily. 

I had no answer ready, and a brief silence followed. The 
subject was not resumed. 

It may well seem strange to my reader that I had never yet 
informed him of the part Clara had had in the matter of the 
sword. But, as I have already said, when anything moved 
me very deeply, I was never ready to talk about it. Some- 
how, whether from something of the cat-nature in me, I never 
liked to let go my hold of it without good reason. Especially 
I shrunk from imparting what I only half comprehended ; 
and besides, in the present case, the thought of Clara’s be- 
haviour was so painful to me still, that I recoiled from any 
talk about it — ^the more that Charley had a kind and good 
opinion of her, and would, I knew, only start objections and 
explanations defensive, as he had done before on a similar oc- 
casion, and this I should have no patience with. I had there- 
fore hitherto held my tongue. There was, of course, likewise 
the fear of betraying his sister, only the danger of that was 
small, now that the communication between the two girls 
seemed at an end for the time ; and if it had not been that a 
certain amount of mutual reticence had arisen between us, 
first on Charley’s part and afterwards on mine, I doubt much 
whether, after all, I should not by this time have told him the 
whole story. But the moment I had spoken as above, the 
strangeness of his look, which Seemed to indicate that he 


CHARLEY AND CLARA. 


405 


would gladly request me to explain myself but for some 
hidden reason, flashed upon me the suspicion that he was 
himself in love with Clara. The momeut the suspicion en- 
tered, a host of circumstances crystalized around it. Fact 
after fact flashed out of my memory, from the first meetiug of 
the two in Switzerland down to this last time I had seen them 
together, and in the same moment I was convinced that the 
lady I saw him with in the Regent’s Park was no other than 
Clara. But if it were so, why had he shut me out from his 
confidence ? Of the possible reasons which suggested them- 
selves, the only one which approached the satisfactory was, 
that he had dreaded hurting me by the confession of his love 
for her, and preferred leaving it to Clara to cure me of a pas- 
sion to which my doubtful opinion of her gave a probability 
of weakness and ultimate evanescence. 

A great conflict awoke in me. What ought I to do ? How 
could I leave him in ignorance of the falsehood of the woman 
he loved ? But I could not make the disclosure now. I must 
think about the how and the how much to tell him. I re- 
turned to the subject which had led up to the discovery. 

“ Does your father keep horses, Charley ?” 

‘‘ He has a horse for his parish work, and my mother has 
an old pony for her carriage.’* 

‘‘ Is the rectory a nice place ?’* 

“ I believe it is, but I have such painful associations with it 
that I hardly know.** 

The Arab loves the desert sand where he was born ; the 
thief loves the court where he used to play in the gutter. 
How miserable Charley’s childhood must have been I How 
could I tell him of Clara’s falsehood ? 

Why doesn’t he give Mary a pony to ride ?” I asked. 
“ But I suppose he hasn’t room for another.” 

‘‘Oh yes, there’s plenty of room. His predecessor was 
rather a big fellow. In fact, the stables are on much too 
large a scale for a clergyman. I dare say he never thought 
of it. I must do my father the justice to say there’s nothing 
stingy about him, and I believe he loves my sister even more 


406 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


than my mother. It certainly would be the best thing he 
could do for her to give her a pony. But she will die of 
religion — young, and be sainted in a two-penny tract, and 
that is better than a pony. Her hair doesn’t curl — that’s the 
only objection. Some one has remarked that all the good 
children who die have curly hair.” 

Poor Charley! Was his mind more healthy then? Was 
he less likely to come to an early death? Was his want of 
faith more life-giving than what he considered her false faith ? 

“ I see no reason to fear it,” I said, with a tremor at my 
heart as I thought of my dream. 

That night I was sleepless — ^but about Charley — not about 
Mary. What could I do ? — What ought I to do ? Might 
there be some mistake in my judgment of Clara ? I searched, 
and I believe searched honestly, for any possible mode of 
accounting for her conduct that might save her uprightness 
or mitigate the severity of the condemnation I had passed upon 
her. I could find none. At the same time, what I was really 
seeking was an excuse for saying nothing to Charley. I sus- 
pect now that had I searched for justification or excuse for 
her from love to herself, I might have succeeded in construct- 
ing a theory capable of sheltering her ; but as it was, I failed 
utterly ; and turning at last from the effort, I brooded instead 
upon the Quixotic idea already adverted to, grown the more 
attractive as offering a good excuse for leaving Charley for a 
little. 


LILITH MEETS WITH A MISFORTUNE. 


407 


CHAPTER LII. 

LILITH MEETS WITH A MISFORTUNE. 

The next day, leaving a note to inform Charley that I had 
run home for a week, I set out for the Moat, carrying with me 
the best side-saddle I could find in London. 

As I left the inn at Minstercombe in a gig, I saw Clara 
coming out of a shop. I could not stop and speak to her, for, 
not to mention the opinion I had of her, and the treachery of 
which I accused her, was I not at that very moment meditating 
how best to let her lover know that she was not to be depended 
upon? I touched the horse with the whip, and drove rapidly 
past. Involuntarily, however, I glanced behind, and saw a 
white face staring after me. Our looks encountered thus, I 
lifted my hat, but held on my course. 

I could not help feeling very sorry for her. The more 
falsely she had behaved, she was the more to be pitied. She 
looked very beautiful with that white face. But how diflEerent 
was her beauty from that of my Athanasia ! 

Having tried the side-saddle upon Lilith, and found all it 
wanted was a little change in the stufl&ng about the withers, I 
told Styles to take it and the mare to Miustercombe the next 
morning, and have it properly fitted. 

What trifles I am lingering upon ! Lilith is gone to the 
worms — no, that I do not believe : amongst the things most 
people believe, and I cannot, that is one ; but at all events 
she is dead, and the saddle gone to worms ; and yet, for rea- 
sons which wull want no explanation to my one reader, I care 
to linger even on the fringes of this part of the web of my 
story. 

I wandered about the fields and house, building and demo- 
lishing many an airy abode until Styles came back. I had 
told him to get the job done at once, and not return without 
the saddle. 


408 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Can I trust you, Styles I said, abruptly. 

“ I hope so, sir. If I may make so bold, I don’t think I 
was altogether to blame about that book ” 

“ Of course not. I told you so. Never think of it again. 
Can you keep a secret ?” 

“ I can try, sir. You’ve been n good master to me, I’m 
sure, sir.” 

“ That I mean to be still, if I can. Do you know the parish 
of Spurdene?” 

“ I was born there, sir.” 

Ah ! that’s not so convenient. Do you know the rectory ?” 

“ Every stone of it, I may say, sir.” 

“ And do they know you ?” 

** Well, it’s some years since I left — a mere boy, sir.” 

“ I want you then — if it be possible — ^you can tell best — to 
set out with Lilith to-morrow night. — I hope it will be a warm 
night. You must groom her thoroughly, put on the side-sad- 
dle and her new bridle, and lead her — you’re not to ride her, 
mind — I don’t want her to get hot — lead her to the rectory of 
Spurdene — and — now here is the point— if it be possible, take 
her up to the stable, and fasten her by this silver chain to the 
ring at the door of it — as near morning as you safely can to 
avoid discovery, for she mustn’t stand longer at this season of 
the year than can be helped. I will tell you all. I mean her 
for a present to Miss Osborne ; but I do not want any one to 
know where she comes from. None of them, I believe, have ever 
seen her. I will write something on a card, which you will fas- 
ten to one of the pommels, throwing over all this horse-cloth.” 

I gave him a fine bear-skin I had bought for the purpose. 
He smiled, and with evident enjoyment of the spirit of the 
thing, promised to do his best. 

Lilith looked lovely as he set out with her, late the follow- 
ing night. When he returned the next morning, he reported 
that everything had succeeded admirably. He had carried 
out my instructions to the letter ; and my white Lilith had by 
that time, I hoped, been caressed, possibly fed, by the hands of 
Mary Osborne herself. 


LILITH MEETS WITH A MISFORTUNE. 


409 


I may just mention that on the card I had written — or 
rather printed the words : “ To Mary Osborne, from a friend.” 

In a day or two, I went back to London, but said nothing 
to Charley of what 1 had done — waiting to hear from him first 
what they said about it. 

“ I say, Wilfrid !” he cried, as he came into my room with 
his usual hurried step, the next morning but one, carrying an 
open letter in his hand, “ what’s this you’ve been doing — ^you 
sly old fellow ? You ought to have been a prince, by Jove !” 

“ What do you accuse me of? I must know that first, else I 
might confess to more than necessary. One must be on one’s 
guard with such as you.” 

“ Read that,” he said, putting the letter into my hand. 

It was from his sister. One passage was as follows : 

•“ A strange thing has happened. A few mornings ago, the 
loveliest white horse was found tied to the stable door, with a 
side-saddle, and a card on it directed to me, I went to look 
at the creature. It was like the witch-lady in Christabel, 
‘beautiful exceedingly.’ I ran to my father, and told him. 
He asked me who had sent it, but I ‘ knew no more than he 
did. He said I couldn’t keep it unless we found out who had 
sent it, and probably not then, for the proceeding was as 
suspicious as absurd. To-day he has put an advertisement in 
the paper to the effect that if the animal is not claimed before, 
it will be sold at the horse-fair next week, and the money 
given to the new school fund. I feel as if I couldn’t bear 
parting with it, but of course I can’t accept a present without 
knowing where it comes from. Have you any idea who sent 
it? lam sure papa is right about it, as indeed, dear Charley, 
he always is.” 

I laid down the letter, and, full of mortification, went 
walking about the room. 

“ Why didn’t you tell me, Wilfrid ?” 

“I thought it better, if you were questioned, that you 
should not know. But it was a foolish thing to do — very. I 
see it now. Of course your father is right. It doesn’t matter 
though.— I will go down and buy her.” 


410 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ You had better not appear in it. Go to the Moat, and 
send Styles.” 

“ Yes —that will be best. Of course it will. When is the 
fair, do you know ?” 

“ I will find out for you. I hope some rascal mayn’t in the 
mean time take my father in, and persuade him to give her 
up. WTiy shouldn’t I run down and tell him, and get back 
poor Lilith without making you pay for your own ?” 

“ Indeed you shan’t. The mare is your sister’s, and I shall 
lay no claim to her. I have money enough to redeem her.” 

Charley got me information about the fair, and the day 
before it I set out for the Moat. 

When I reached Minstercombe, having more time on my 
hands than I knew what to do with, I resolved to walk round 
by Spurdene. It would not be more than ten or twelve miles, 
and so I should get a peep of the rectory. On the way I met 
a few farmer-looking men on horseback, and just before 
entering the village, saw at a little distance a white creature — 
very like my Lilith — with a man on its back, coming towards 
me. 

As they drew nearer, I was certain of the mare, and 
thinking it possible the rider might be Mr. Osborne, withdrew 
into a thicket on the roadside. But what was my dismay to 
discover that it was indeed my Lilith, but ridden by Geofirey 
Brotherton ! As soon as he was past, I rushed into the village, 
and found that the people I had met were going from the fair. 
Charley had been misinformed. I was too late : Brotherton 
had bought my Lilith. Half distracted with rage and vexa- 
tion, I walked on and on, never halting till I reached the 
Moat. Was this man destined to swallow up everything I 
cared for? Had he suspected me as the foolish donor, and 
bought the mare to spite me? A thousand times rather 
would I have had her dead. Nothing on earth would have 
tempted me to sell my Lilith but inability to feed her, and 
then I would rather have shot her. I felt poorer than even 
when my precious folio was taken from me, for the lowest 
animal life is a greater thing than a rare edition. I did not 


LILITH MEETS WITH A MISFORTUNE. 


411 


go to bed at all that night, but sat by my fire or paced about 
the room till dawn, when I set out for Minstercombe, and 
reached it in time for the morning coach to London. The 
whole aSair was a folly, and I said to myself that I deserved 
to suffer. Before I left, I told Styles, and begged him to keep 
an eye on the mare, and if ever he learned that her owner 
wanted to part with her, to come off at once and let me know. 
He was greatly concerned at my ill-luck, as he called It, and 
promised to watch her carefully. He knew one of the 
grooms, he said, a little, and would cultivate his acquain- 
tance. 

I could not help wishing now that Charley would let his 
sister know what I had tried to do for her, but of course I 
would not say so. I think he did tell her, but I never could 
be quite certain whether or not she knew it. I wonder if she 
ever suspected me. I think not. I have too good reason to 
fear that she attributed to another the would-be gift: I believe 
that from Brotherton’s buying her, they thought he had sent 
her — a present certainly far more befitting his means than 
mine. But I came to care very little about it, for my cor- 
respondence with her, through Charley, went on. I wondered 
sometimes how she could keep from letting her father know : 
that he did not know I was certain, for he would have put a 
stop to it at once. I conjectured that she had told her mother, 
and that she, fearing to widen the breach between her hus- 
band and Charley, had advised her not to mention it to him ; 
while, believing it would do both Charley and me good, she 
did not counsel her to give up the correspondence. It must 
be considered also that it was long before I said a word imply- 
ing any personal interest. Before I ventured that, I had some 
ground for thinking that my ideas had begun to tell upon 
hers, for, even in her letters to Charley, she had begun to drop 
the common religious phrases, while all she said seemed to 
indicate a widening and deepening and simplifying of her 
faith. I do not for a moment imply that she had consciously 
given up one of the dogmas of the party to which she 
belonged, but there was the perceptible softening of growth in 


412 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


her utterances ; and after that was plain to me, I began to let 
out my heart to her a little more. 

About this time also I began to read once more the history 
of Jesus, asking myself as if on a first acquaintance with it, 
“ Could it be — might it not be that, if there were a God, he 
would visit his children after some fashion ? If so, is this a 
likely fashion ? May it not even be the only right fashion T 
In the story I found at least a perfection surpassing everything 
to be found elsewhere ; and I was at least sure that whatever 
this man said must be true. K one could only be as sure of 
the record ! But if ever a dawn was to rise upon me, here 
certainly the sky would break ; here I thought I already saw 
the first tinge of the returning life-blood of the swooning 
world. The gathering of the waters of conviction at length 
one morning broke out in the following verses, which seemed 
more than half given to me, the only efibrt required being to 
fit them rightly together : — 

Come to me, come to me, 0 my Godj 
Come to me everywhere I 

Let the trees mean thee, and the grassy sod, 

And the water and the air. 

For thou art so far that I often doubt, 

As on every side I stare. 

Searching within, and looking without, 

If thou art anywhere. 

How did men find thee in days of old ? 

How did they grow so sure ? 

They fought in thy name, they were glad and bold. 

They suffered, and kept themselves pure. 

But now they say — neither above the sphere, 

Nor down in the heart of man, 

But only in fancy, ambition, or fear. 

The thought of thee began. 

If only that perfect tale were true 
Which with touch of sunny gold. 

Of the ancient many makes one anew. 

And simplicity manifold. 


LILITH MEETS WITH A MISFORTUNE, 


4ia 


But he sold that they who did his word. 

The truth of it should know : 

I will try to do it — ^if he be Lord, 

Perhaps the old spring will flow; 

Perhaps the old spirit-wind will blow 
That he promised to their prayer > 

And doing thy will, I yet shall know 
Thee, Father, everywhere ! 

These lines found their way without my concurrence into a 
certain religious magazine, and I was considerably astonished, 
and yet more pleased one evening when Charley handed me, 
with the kind regards of his sister, my own lines copied by 
herself. I speedily let her know they were mine, explaining 
that they had found their way into print without my cogni- 
zance. She testified so much pleasure at the fact, and the 
little scraps I could claim as my peculiar share of the con- 
tents of Charley’s envelopes, grew so much more confiding, 
that I soon ventured to write more warmly than hitherto. A 
period longer than usual passed before she wrote again, and 
when she did she took no express notice of my last letter. 
Foolishly or not, I regarded this as a favorable sign, and wrote 
several letters, in which I allowed the true state of my 
feelings towards her to appear. At length I wrote a long 
letter in which, without a word of direct love-making, I 
thought yet to reveal that I loved her with all my heart. It 
was chiefly occupied with my dream on that memorable night 
— of course without the slightest allusion to the waking, or 
anything that followed. I ended abruptly, telling her that 
the dream often recurred, but as often as it drew to its lovely 
close, the lifted veil of Athanasia revealed ever and only the 
countenance of Mary Osborne. 

The answer to this came soon, and in few words. 

I dare not take to myself what you write. That would be 
presumption indeed, not to say willfiil self-deception. It will 
be honor enough for me if in any way I serve to remind you 
of the lady of your dream. Wilfrid, if you love me, take 
care of my Charley. I must not write more. — M. O.” 


414 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


It was not much, but enough to make me happy. I write 
it from memory — every word as it lies where any moment I 
could read it — ^shut in a golden coffin whose lid I dare not 
open. 


TOO LATE. 


415 


CHAPTER LIIL 

TOO LATE. 

I MUST now go back a little. After my suspicions had been 
aroused as to the state of Charley’s feelings, I hesitated for a 
long time before I finally made up my mind to tell him the 
part Clara had had in the loss of my sword. But while I was 
thus restrained by dread of the effect the disclosure would 
have upon him if my suspicions were correct, those very sus- 
picions formed the strongest reason for acquainting him with 
her duplicity ; and, although I was always too ready to put 
oflT the evil day so long as doubt supplied excuse for procras- 
tination, I could not have let so much time slip by and 
nothing said, but for my absorption in Mary. 

At length, however, I had now resolved, and one evening, 
as we sat together, I took my pipe from my mouth, and, 
shivering bodily, thus began : 

“ Charley,” I said, “ I have had for a good while something 
on my mind, which I cannot keep from you longer.” 

He looked alarmed instantly. I went on. 

“ I have not been quite open with you about that afiair of 
the sword.” 

He looked yet more dismayed ; but I must go on, though it 
tore my very heart. When I came to the point of my over- 
hearing Clara talking to Brotherton, he started up, and with- 
out waiting to know the subject of their conversation, came 
close up to me, and, his face distorted with the effort to keep 
himself quiet, said, in a voice hollow and still and far off, like 
what one fancies of the voice of the dead, 

“ Wilfrid, you said Brotherton, I think ?” 

«I did, Charley.” 

“She never told me that I” 

“ How could she when she was betraying your friend 


416 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ No, no he cried, with a strange mixture of command 
and entreaty : “ don’t say that. There is some explanation ; 
there must be. 

“ She told me she hated him,” I said. 

“ I IcTiow she hates him. What was she saying to him ?” 

“ I tell you she was betraying me, your friend, who had 
never done her any wrong, to the man she had told me she 
hated, and whom I had heard her ridicule.” 

“ What do you mean by betraying you?” 

I recounted what I had overheard. He listened with clenched 
teeth and trembling white lips; then burst into a forced laugh. 

“What a fool I am! Distrust her! I will not. There 
IS some explanation ! There must be I” 

The dew of agony lay thick on his forehead. I was greatly 
alarmed at what I had done, but I could not blame myself. 

“ Do be calm, Charley,” I entreated. 

“ I am as calm as death,” he replied, striding up and down 
the room with long strides. 

He stopped and came np to me again. 

“Wilfrid,” he said, “I am a damned fool. I am going 
now. Don’t be frightened — I am perfectly calm. I will come 
and explain it all to you to-morrow — no — the next day — or the 
next at latest. She had some reason for hiding it from me, but 
I shall have it all the moment I ask her. She is not what 
you think her. I don’t for a moment blame you — but — are 
you sure it was — Clara’s voice you heard ?” he added, with 
forced calmness and slow utterance. 

“ A man is not likely to mistake the voice of a woman he 
ever fancied himself in love with.” 

“Don’t talk like that, Wilfrid. You’ll drive me mad. 
How should she know you had taken the sword ?” 

“ She was always urging me to take it. There lies the main 
sting of the treachery. But I never told you where I found 
the sword.” 

“ What can that have to do with it ?” 

“ I found it on my bed that same morning when I woke. 
It could not have been there when I lay down.” 


TOO LATE. 


417 


« Welir 

“ Charley, I believe she laid it there.” 

He leaped at me like a tiger. Startled, I jumped to my feet. 
He laid hold of me by the throat, and griped me with a 
quivering grasp. Recovering my self-possession I stood perfectly 
still, making no effort even to remove his hand, although it 
was all but choking me. In a moment or two he relaxed his 
hold, burst into tears, took up his hat, and walked to the door. 

“ Charley ! Charley ! you must not leave me so,” I cried, 
starting forwards. 

“ To-morrow, Wilfrid ; to-morrow,” he said, and was gone. 

He was back before I could think what to do next. Open- 
ing the door half-way, he said — as if a griping hand had 
been on his throat — “ I — I — — don’t believe it, Wilfrid. You 
only said you believed it. I don’t. Good-night. I’m all 
right now. Mindy I don^t believe iV^ 

He shut the door. Why did I not follow him ? But if I 
had followed him, what could I have said or done ? In every 
man’s life come awful moments when he must meet his fate — 
dree his weird — alone. Alone, I say, if he have no God — 
for man or woman cannot aid him, cannot touch him, cannot 
come near him. Charley was now in one of those crises, and 
I could not help him. Death is counted an awful thing : it 
seems to me that life is an infinitely more awful thing. 

In the morning I received the following letter : 

“ Dear Mr. Cumbermede, 

“ You will be surprised at receiving a note from me — still 
more at its contents. I am most anxious to see you — so much 
so that I venture to ask you to meet me where we can have a 
little quiet talk. I am in London, and for a day or two suffi- 
ciently my own mistress to leave the choice of time and place 
with you — only let it be when and where we shall not be in- 
terrupted. I presume an old friendship in making this extra- 
ordinary request, but I do not presume in my confidence that 
you will not misunderstand my motives. One thing only I 
leg — that you will not inform C. O. of the petition I make. 

“ Your old friend, C. C.” 


27 


418 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


What was I to do? To go, of course. She might have 
something to reveal which would cast light on her mysterious 
conduct. I cannot say I expected a disclosure capable of re- 
moving Charley’s misery, but I did vaguely hope to learn 
something that might alleviate it. Anyhow, I would meet 
her, for I dared not refuse to hear her. To her request of 
concealing it from Charley, I would grant nothing beyond 
giving it quarter until I should see whither the affair tended. 
I wrote at once — making an appointment for the same even- 
ing. But was it from a suggestion of Satan, from an evil 
impulse of human spite, or by the decree of fate, that I fixed 
on that part of the Kegent’s Park in which I had seen him 
and the lady I now believe to have been Clara walking 
together in the dusk ? I cannot now tell. The events which 
followed have destroyed all certainty, but I fear it was a 
fiutter of the wings of revenge, a shove at the spokes of the 
wheel of time to hasten the coming of its circle. 

Anxious to keep out of Charley’s way —for the secret would 
make me wretched in his presence — I went into the city, and, 
after an early dinner, sauntered out to the Zoological Gardens, 
to spend the time till the hour of meeting. But there, strange 
to say, whether from insight or fancy, in every animal face I 
saw such gleams of troubled humanity, that at last I could 
bear it no longer, and betook myself to Primrose Hill. 

It was a bright afternoon, wonderfully clear, with a crisp 
frosty feel in the air. But the sun went down, and, one by one, 
here and there, above and below, the lights came out and the 
stars appeared, until at length sky and earth were full of 
flaming spots, and it was time to seek our rendezvous. 

I had hardly reached it, when the graceful form of Clara 
glided towards me. She perceived in a moment that I did not 
mean to shake hands with her. It was not so dark but that I 
saw her bosom heave, and a flush overspread her countenance. 

“ You wished to see me. Miss Coningham,” I said. “ I am 
at your service.” 

“What is wrong, Mr. Cumbermede? You never used to 
speak to me in such a tone.” 


TOO LATE. 


419 


“ There is nothing wrong if you are not more able than I 
to tell what it is.” 

“ Why did you come if you were going to treat me so ?” 

“ Because you requested it.” 

“ Have I offended you then by asking you to meet me ? 1 
trusted you. I thought you would never misjudge me.” 

“ I should be but too happy to find I had been unjust to 
you, Miss Coningham. I would gladly go on my knees to 
you to confess that fault, if I could only be satisfied of its 
existence. Assure me of it, and I will bless you.” 

‘‘ How strangely you talk ? Some one has been maligning 
me.” 

No one. But I have come to the knowledge of what only 
one besides yourself could have told me.” 

“You mean ” 

“ Geoffrey Brotherton.” 

“ He I He has been telling you ” 

“ No — thank heaven ! I have not yet sunk to the slightest 
communication with him.'* 

She turned her face aside. Veiled as it was by the gather- 
ing gloom, she yet could not keep it towards me. But after 
a brief pause she looked at me and said, 

“ You know more than — I do not know what you mean.” 

“ I do know more than you think I know. I will tell you 
under what circumstances I came to such knowledge.” 

She stood motionless. 

One evening,” I went on, “ after leaving Moldwarp Hall 
with Charles Osborne, I returned to the library to fetch a book. 
As I entered the room where it lay I heard voices in the 
armory. One was the voice of Geoffrey Brotherton — a man 
you told me you hated. The other was yours.” 

She drew herself up and stood stately before me. 

“ Is that your accusation ?” she said. “ Is a woman never 
to speak to a man because she detests him ?” 

She laughed, I thought drearily. 

“Apparently not — for then I presume you would not have 
asked me to meet you.” 


420 


WILFKID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ Why should you think I hate you 

“ Because you have been treacherous to me/’ 

“ In talking to Geoffrey Brother ton ? I do hate him. I 
hate him more than ever. I spoke the truth when I told you 
that.” 

Then you do not hate me ?” 

“No.” 

“ And yet you delivered me over to my enemy bound hand 
and foot, as Delilah did Samson. I heard what you said to 
Brotherton.” 

She seemed to waver, but stood — speechless, as if waiting 
for more. 

“ I heard you tell him that I had taken that sword — the 
sword you had always been urging me to take — the sword you 
unsheathed and laid on my bed that I might be tempted to 
take it — why I cannot understand, for I never did you a 
wrong to my poor knowledge. I fell into your snare, and you 
made use of the fact you had achieved to ruin my character, 
and drive me from the house in which I was foolish enough to 
regard myself as conferring favors rather than receiving them. 
You have caused me to be branded as a thief for taking — at 
your suggestion — ^that which was and still is my own !” 

“Does Charley know this?” she asked in a strangely 
altered voice. 

“ He does. He learned it yesterday.” 

“ O my God !” she cried, and fell kneeling on the grass at 
my feet. “ Wilfrid ! Wilfrid ! I will tell you all. It was to 
tell you all about this very thing that I asked you to come. 
I could not bear it longer. Only your tone made me angry. 
I did not know you knew so much.” 

The very fancy of such submission from such a creature 
would have thrilled me with a wild compassion once ; but 
now I thought of Charley, and felt cold to her sorrow as well 
as her loveliness. When she lifted her eyes to mine, however 
— it was not so dark but I could see their sadness — I began to 
hope a little for my friend. I took her hand and raised her. 
She was now weeping with downbent head. 


TOO LATE. 


421 


Clara, you shall tell me all. God forbid I should be hard 
upon you. But you know I cannot understand it. I have no 
clew to it. How could you serve me so 

It is very hard for me — but there is no help now ; I must 
confess disgrace in order to escape infamy. Listen to me, 
then — as kindly as you can, Wilfrid. I beg your pardon ; I 
have no right to use any old familiarity with you. Had my 
father’s plans succeeded, I should still have had to make an 
apology to you, but under what different circumstances ! I 
will be as brief as I can. My father believed you the rightful 
heir to Mold warp Hall. Your own father believed it, and 
made my father believe it — that was in case your uncle should 
leave no heir behind him. But your uncle was a strange 
man, and would neither lay claim to the property himself, nor 
allow you to be told of your prospects. He did all he could 
to make you like himself, indifferent to worldly things ; and 
my father feared you would pride yourself on refusing to 
claim your rights except some counter-influence were used.” 

“ But why should your father have taken any trouble in the 
matter ?” I asked. 

“ Well, you know — one in his profession likes to see justice 
done ; and, besides, to conduct such a case must of course be 
of professional advantage to him. You must not think him 
under obligation to the present family ; my grandfather held 
the position he still occupies before they came into the 
property. — I am too unhappy to mind what I say now. My 
father was pleased when you and I — indeed I fancy he had a 
hand in our flrst meeting. But while your uncle lived, he 
had to be cautious. Chance, however, seemed to favor his 
wishes. We met more than once, and you liked me, and my 
father thought I might wake you up to care about your rights, 
and — and — but — ” 

“ I see. And it might have been, Clara, but for — ” 

“ Only, you see, Mr. Cumbermede,” she interrupted with a 
half-smile, and a little return of her playful manner— “J 
didn’t wish it.” 

“ No. You preferred the man who had the property.” 


422 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


It was a speech both cruel and rude. She stepped a pace 
back, and looked me proudly in the face. 

“ Prefer that man to yoUy Wilfrid ! No. I could never 
have fallen so low as that. But I confess I didn’t mind 
letting papa understand that Mr. Brotherton was polite to me 
—just to keep him from urging me to — to — You will do me 
the justice that I did not try to make you — to make you — 
care for me, Wilfrid 

“I admit it heartily. I will be as honest as you, and 
confess that you might have done so — easily enough at one 
time. Indeed I am only half honest after all j I loved you 
once — ^after a boyish fashion.” 

She half-smiled again. 

“ I am glad you are believing me now,” she said. 

“ Thoroughly,” I answered. “ When you speak the truth, 
I must believe you.” 

“ I was afraid to let papa know the real state of things. I 
was always afraid of him, though I love him dearly, and he 
is very good to me. I dared not disappoint him by telling 
him that I loved Charley Osborne. That time — you remem- 
ber — when we met in Switzerland, his strange ways interested 
me so much I I was only a girl — but ” 

“ I understand well enough. I don’t wonder at any woman 
falling in love with my Charley.” 

“ Thank you,” she said, with a sigh which seemed to come 
from the bottom of her heart. “ You were always generous. 
You will do what you can to right me with Charley — won’t 
you ? He is very strange sometimes.” 

“ I will indeed. But, Clara, why didn’t Charley let me 
know that you and he loved each other ?” 

“ Ah ! there my shame comes in again ! I wanted — ^for my 
father’s sake, not for my own — I need not tell you that — I 
wanted to keep my influence over you a little while — ^that is 
until I could gain my father’s end. If I should succeed in 
rousing you to enter an action for the recovery of your rights, 
I thought my father might then be reconciled to my marrying 
Charley instead ” 


TOO LATE. 


423 


“ Instead of me, Clara. Yes — I see. I begin to under- 
stand the whole thing. It’s not so bad as I thought — not by 
any means.” 

“ Oh, Wilfrid ! how good of you ! I shall love you next to 
Charley all my life.” 

She caught hold of my hand, and for a moment seemed on 
the point of raising it to her lips. 

“ But I can’t easily get over the disgrace you have done me, 
Clara. Neither, I confess, can I get over your degrading 
yourself to a private interview with such a beast as I know — 
and can’t help suspecting you knew Brotherton to be.” 

She dropped my hand, and hid her face in both her own. 

“ I did know what he was ; but the thought of Charley 
made me able to go through with it.” 

“ With the sacrifice of his friend to his enemy ?” 

“ It was bad. It was horridly wicked. I hate myself for 
it. But you know I thought it would do you no harm in the 
end.” 

“ How much did Charley know of it all ?” I asked. 

“Nothing whatever. How could I trust his innocence? 
He’s the simplest creature in the world, Wilfrid.” 

“ I know that well enough.” 

“ I could not confess one atom of it to him. He would 
have blown up the whole scheme at once. It was all I could 
do to keep him from telling you of our engagement ; and that 
made him miserable.” 

“ Hid you tell him I was in love with you ? You knew I 
was, well enough.” 

“ I dared not do that,” she said, with a sad smile. “ He 
would have vanished — would have killed himself to make 
way for you.” 

“ I see you understand him, Clara.” 

“ That will give me some feeble merit in your eyes — ^won’t 
it, Wilfrid ?” 

“ Still I don’t see quite why you betrayed me to Brotherton. 
I dare say I should if I had time to think it over.” 

“ I wanted to put you in such a position with regard to the 


424 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Brothertons tliat you could have no scruples in respect of 
them such as my father feared from what he called the over- 
refinement of your ideas of honor. The treatment you must 
receive would, I thought, rouse every feeling against them. 
But it was not all for my father’s sake, Wilfrid. It was, 
however mistaken, yet a good deal for the sake of Charley’s 
friend that I thus disgraced myself. Can you believe me ?” 

“ I do. But nothing can wipe out the disgrace to me.” 

“ The sword was your own. Of course I never for a 
moment doubted that.” 

“ But they believed I was lying.” 

“ I can’t persuade myself it signifies greatly what such 
people think about you. I except Sir Giles. The rest 
are ” 

“ Yet you consented to visit them.” 

“ I was in reality Sir Giles’s guest. Not one of the others 
would have asked me.” 

“Not Geofirey?” 

“ I owe him nothing but undying revenge for Charley.” 

Her eyes flashed through the darkness, and she looked as 
if she could have killed him. 

“ But you were plotting, against Sir Giles all the time you 
were his guest ?” 

“Not unjustly though. The property was not his, but 
yours — that is, as we then believed. As far as I knew, the 
result would have been a real service to him, in delivering 
him from unjust possession — a thing he would himself have 
scorned. It was all very wrong — very low, if you like — but 
somehow it then seemed simple enough — a lawful stratagem 
for the right.” 

“ Your heart was so full of Charley !” 

“ Then you do forgive me,. Wilfrid ?” 

“ With all my soul. I hardly feel now as if I had anything 
to forgive.” 

I drew her towards me and kissed her on the forehead. 
She threw her arms around me, and clung to me, sobbing like 
a child. 


TOO LATE. 


425 


“ You iviil explain it ail to Charley — won’t you?” she said, 
as soon as she could speak, withdrawing herself from the arm 
which had involuntarily crept around her, seeking to comfort 
her. 

“ I will,” I said. 

We were startled by a sound in the clump of trees behind us. 
Then over their tops passed a wailful gust of wind, through 
which we thought came the fall of receding footsteps. 

“ I hope we haven’t been overheard,” I said. “ I shall go 
at once and tell Charley all about it. I will just see you home 
first.” 

“ There’s no occasion for that, Wilfrid ; and I’m sure I don’t 
deserve it.” 

“ You deserve a thousand thanks. You have lifted a moun- 
tain off me. I see it all now. When your father found it 
was no use ” 

“ Then I saw I had wronged you, and I couldn’t bear myself 
till I had confessed all.” 

“ Your father is satisfied then that the register would not 
stand in evidence ?” 

“ Yes. He told me all about it.” 

“He has never said a word to me on the matter; but just 
dropped me in the dirt, and let me lie there.” 

“ You must forgive him too, Wilfrid. It was a dreadful 
blow to him, and it was weeks before he told me. We couldn’t 
think what was the matter with him. You see he had been 
cherishing the scheme ever since your father’s death, and it 
was a great humiliation to find he had been sitting so many 
years on an addled egg,” she said, with a laugh in which her 
natural merriment once more peeped out. 

I walked home with her, and we parted like old friends. 

On my way to the Temple, I was anxiously occupied as to 
how Charley would receive the explanation I had to give him. 
That Clara’s confession would be a relief I could not doubt ; 
but it must cause him great pain notwithstanding. His sense 
of honor was so keen, and his ideal of womankind so lofty, 
that I could not but dread the consequences of the revelation. 


426 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


At the same time I saw how it might benefit him. I had 
begun to see that it is more divine to love the erring than to 
love the good, and to understand how there is more joy over 
the one than over the ninety and nine. If Charley, under- 
standing that he is no divine lover who loves only so long as 
he is able to flatter himself that the object of his love is imma- 
culate, should find that he must love Clara in spite of her faults 
and wrong-doings, he might thus grow to be less despairful 
over his own failures ; he might, through his love for Clara, 
learn to hope for himself, notwithstanding the awful distance 
at which perfection lay removed. 

But as I went I was conscious of a strange oppression. It 
was not properly mental, for my interview with Clara had 
raised my spirits. It was a kind of physical oppression I felt, 
as if the air, which was in reality clear and cold, had been 
damp and close and heavy. 

I went straight to Charley’s chambers. The moment I 
opened the door, I knew that something was awfully wrong. 
The room was dark — but he would often sit in the dark. I 
called him, but received no answer. Trembling, I struck a 
light, for I feared to move lest I should touch something 
dreadful. But when I had succeeded in lighting the lamp, I 
found the room just as it always was. His hat was on the 
table. He must be in his bed-room. And yet I did not feel 
as if anything alive was near me. Why was everything so 
frightfully still? I opened the door as slowly and fearfully as 
if I had dreaded arousing a sufierer whose life depended on 
his repose. There he lay on his bed, in his clothes — fast 
asleep, as I thought, for he often slept so, and at any hour of 
the day — the natural relief of his much-perturbed mind. His 
eyes were closed, and his face was very white. As I looked. I 
heard a sound — a drop — another! There was a slow drip 
somewhere. God in heaven ! Could it be ? I rushed to him, 
calling him aloud. There was no response. It was too true I 
He was dead. The long-snake-like Indian dagger was in his 
heart, and the blood was oozing slowly from around it. 

I dare not linger over that horrible night, or the horrible 


TOO LATE. 


427 


days that followed. Such days ! such nights I The letters to 
write ! — The friends to tell ! — Clara ! — His father ! — ^The police! 
— The inquest ! * * * 

Mr. Osborne took no notice of my letter, but came up at 
once. Entering where I sat with my head on my arms on the 
table, the first announcement I had of his presence was a 
hoarse, deep, broken voice ordering me out of the room. I 
obeyed mechanically, took up Charley’s hat instead of my own, 
and walked away with it. But the neighbors were kind, and 
although I did not attempt to approach again all that was left 
of my friend, I watched from a neighboring window, and fol- 
lowing at a little distance, was present when they laid his form, 
late at night, in the unconsecrated ground of a cemetery. 

I may just mention here what I had not the heart to dwell 
upon in the course of my narrative — that since the talk about 
suicide, occasioned by the remarks of Sir Thomas Browne, he 
had often brought up the subject — chiefly however in a half- 
humorous tone, and from what may be called an aesthetic point 
of view, as to the best mode of accomplishing it. For some 
of the usual modes he expressed abhorrence, as being so ugly ; 
and on the whole considered — I well remember the phrase, 
for he used it more than once — that a dagger — and on one of 
those occasions he took up the Indian weapon already described, 
and said— “ such as this now,” — was “ the most gentleman-like 
usher into the presence of the Great Nothing.” As I had, 
however, often heard that those who contemplated suicide 
never spoke of it, and as his manner on the occasions to which 
I refer was always merry, such talk awoke little uneasiness ; 
and I believe that he never had at the moment any conscious 
attracting to the subject stronger than a speculative one. At 
the same time, however, I believe that the speculative attrac- 
tion itself had its roots in the misery with which in other and 
prevailing moods he was so familiar. 


428 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER LIV. 

ISOLATION. 

After writing to Mr. Osborne to acquaint him with the 
terrible event, the first thing I did was to go to Clara. I wiU 
not attempt to describe what followed. The moment she saw 
me, her face revealed, as in a mirror, the fact legible on my 
own, and I had scarcely opened my mouth when she cried, 
“ He is dead!” and fell fainting on the floor. Her aunt came, 
and we succeeded in recovering her a little. But she lay still 
as death on the couch where we had laid her, and the 
motion of her eyes hither and thither as if following the move- 
ments of some one about the room was the only sign of life in 
her. We spoke to her, but evidently she heard nothing ; and 
at last, leaving her when the doctor arrived, I waited for her 
aunt in another room, and told her what had happened. 

Some days after, Clara sent for me, and I had to tell her the 
whole story. Then, with agony in every word she uttered, she 
managed to inform me that when she went in after I left her 
at the door that night, she found waiting her a note from 
Charley ; and this she now gave me to read. It contained a 
request to meet him that evening at the very place which I 
had appointed. It was their customary rendezvous when she 
was in town. In all probability he was there when we were, 
and heard and saw — heard too little and saw too much, and 
concluded that both Clara and I were false to him. The fright- 
ful perturbation which a conviction such as that must cause in 
a mind like his could be nothing short of madness. For, ever 
tortured by a sense of his own impotence, of the gulf to all 
appearance eternally fixed between his actions and his aspira- 
tions, and unable to lay hold of the Essential, the Causing 
Goodness, he had clung with the despair of a perishing man to 
the dim reflex of good he saw in her and me. If his faith in 


ISOLATION. 


429 


that was indeed destroyed, the last barrier must have given 
way, and the sea of madness, ever breaking against it, must 
have broken in and overwhelmed him. But, O my friend ! 
surely long ere now thou knowest that we were not false; surely 
the hour will yet dawn when I shall again hold thee to my 
heart ; yea, surely, even if still thou countest me guilty, thou 
hast already found for me endless excuse and forgiveness. 

I can hardly doubt, however, that he inherited a strain of 
madness from his father, a madness which that father had 
developed by forcing upon him the false forms of a true reli- 
gion.^ 

It is not then strange that I should have thought and specu- 
lated much about madness. What does its frequent impulse 
to suicide indicate ? May it not be its main instinct to destroy 
itself as an evil thing ? May not the impulse arise from some 
unconscious conviction that there is for it no remedy but the 
shuffling off of this mortal coil — nature herself dimly urging 
through the fumes of the madness to the one blow which lets 
in the light and air? Doubtless, if in the mind so sadly 
unhinged, the sense of a holy Presence could be developed — 
the sense of a love that loves through all vagaries — of a hiding- 
place from forms of evil the most fantastic — of a fatherly care 
that not merely holds its insane child in its arms, but enters 
into the chaos of his imagination, and sees every wildest horror 
with which it swarms ; if, I say, the conviction of such love 
dawned on the disordered mind, the man would live in spite of 
his imaginary foes, for he would pray against them as sure of 
being heard as St. Paul when he prayed concerning the thorn 
from which he was not delivered, but against which he was sus- 
tained. And who can tell how often this may be the fact — 
how often the lunatic also lives by faith ? Are not the forms 
of madness most frequently those of love and religion ? Cer- 
tainly, if there be a God, he does not forget his frenzied off- 
spring ; certainly he is more tender over them than any mother 
over her idiot darling; certainly he sees in them what the eye 
of brother or sister cannot see. But some of them at least 
have not enough of such support to be able to go on living ; 


430 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


and for my part I confess I rejoice as often as I hear that one 
has succeeded in breaking his prison bars. 

When the crystal shrine has grown dim, and the fair forms 
of nature are in their entrance contorted hideously ; when the 
sunlight itself is as blue lightning, and the wind in the summer 
trees is as “ a terrible sound of stones cast down, or a rebound- 
ing echo from the hollow mountains ,* ” when the body is no 
longer a mediator between the soul and the world, but the 
prison-house of a lying jailer and torturer — ^how can I but re- 
joice to hear that the tormented captive has at length forced 
his way out into freedom ? 

When I look behind me, I can see but little through the 
surging lurid smoke of that awful time. The first sense of re- 
lief came when I saw the body of Charley laid in the holy 
earth. For the earth is the Lord’s — and none the less holy 
that the voice of the priest may have left it without his conse- 
cration. Surely if ever the Lord laughs in derision, as the 
Psalmist says, it must be when the voice of a man would in 
his name exclude his fellows from their birthright. O Lord, 
gather thou the outcasts of thy Israel, whom the priests and 
the rulers of thy people have cast out to perish ! 

I remember for the most part only a dull agony, inter- 
changing with apathy. For days and days I could not rest, 
but walked hither and thither, careless whither. When at 
length I would lie down weary and fall asleep, suddenly I 
Would start up, hearing the voice of Charley crying for help, 
and rush in the middle of the winter night into the wretched 
streets, there to wander till daybreak. But I was not utterly 
miserable. In my most wretched dreams I never dreamed 
of Mary, and through all my waking distress I never forgot 
her. I was sure in my very soul that she did me no in- 
justice. I had laid open the deepest in me to her honest 
gaze, and she had read it, and could not but know me. 
Neither did what had occurred quench my growing faith. I 
had never been able to hope much for Charley in this world ; 
for something was out of joint with him, and only in the region 
of the unknown was I able to look for the setting right of it. 


ISOLATION. 


431 


Nor had many weeks passed before I was fully aware of relief 
when I remembered that he was dead. And whenever the 
thought arose that God might have given him a fairer chance 
in this world, I was able to reflect that apparently God does 
not care for this world save as a part of the whole ; and on 
that whole I had yet to discover that he could have given him 
a fairer chance. 


432 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDB. 


CHAPTER LV. 

ATTEMPTS AND COINCIDENCES. 

It was months before I could resume my work. Not until 
Charley’s absence was as it were so far established and accepted 
that hope had begun to assert itself against memory ; that is, 
not until the form of Charley ceased to wander with despairful 
visage behind me and began to rise amongst the silvery mists 
before me, was I able to invent once more, or even to guide the 
pen with certainty over the paper. The moment, however, 
that I took the pen in my hand another necessity seized me. 

Although Mary had hardly been out of my thoughts, I had 
heard no word of her since her brother’s death. I dared not 
write to her father or mother after the way the former had 
behaved to me, and I shrunk from approaching Mary with a 
word that might suggest a desire to intrude the thoughts of 
myself upon the sacredness of her grief. Why should she 
think of me ? Sorrow has ever something of a divine majesty, 
before which one must draw nigh with bowed head and bated 
breath : 

Here I and sorrow sit ; 

Here is my throne : bid kings come bow to it. 

But the moment I took the pen in my hand to write, an almost 
agonizing desire to speak to her laid hold of me. I dared not 
yet write to her, but, after reflection, resolved to send her some 
verses which should make her think of both Charley and 
myself, through the pages of a magazine which I knew she 
read. 

0 look not on the heart I bring — 

It is too low and poor j 

1 would not have thee love a thing 
Which I can ill endure. 

Nor love me for the sake of what 
I would be if I could ; 

O’er peaks as o’er the marshy flat, 

Still soars the sky of good. 


ATTEMPTS AND COINCIDENCES. 


433 


See, love, afar, the heavenly man 
The will of God would make ; 

The thing I must be when I can. 

Love now, for faith’s dear sake. 

But when I had finished the lines, I found the expression 
had fallen so far short of what I had in my feeling, that I 
could not rest satisfied with such an attempt at communica- 
tion. I walked up and down the room thinking of the awful 
theories regarding the state of mind at death in which Mary 
had been trained. As to the mere suicide, love ever finds 
refuge in presumed madness ; but all of her school believed 
that at the moment of dissolution the fate is eternally fixed 
either for bliss or woe, determined by the one or the other of 
two vaguely defined attitudes of the mental being towards cer- 
tain propositions ; concerning which attitudes they were at least 
right in asserting that no man could of himself assume the safe 
one. The thought became unendurable that Mary should be- 
lieve that Charley was damned — and that forever and ever. I 
must and would write to her, come of it what might. That 
my Charley, whose suicide came of misery that the painful 
flutterings of his half-born wings would not bear him aloft into 
the empyrean, should appear to my Athanasia lost in the abyss 
of irrecoverable woe ; that she should think of God as sending 
forth his spirit to sustain endless wickedness for endless tor- 
ture ; — it was too frightful. As I wrote, the fire burned and 
burned, and I ended only from despair of utterance. Not a 
word can I now recall of what I wrote : — the strength of my 
feelings must have paralyzed the grasp of my memory. All I 
can recollect is that I closed with the expression of a passionate 
hope that the God who had made me and my Charley to love 
each other, would somewhere, some day, somehow, when each 
was grown stronger and purer, give us once more to each other. 
In that hope alone, I said, was it possible for me to live. By 
return of post, I received the following : — 

‘‘ Sir — After having everlastingly ruined one of my children, 
body and soul, for your sophisms will hardly alter the decrees 
of divine justice, — once more you lay your snares — now to 
28 


434 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


drag my sole remaining child into the same abyss of perdition* 
Such wickedness — wickedness even to the pitch of blasphemy 
against the Holy Ghost, I have never in the course of a large 
experience of impenitence found paralleled. It almost drives 
me to the belief that the enemy of souls is still occasionally per- 
mitted to take up his personal abode in the heart of him who 
willfully turns aside from revealed truth. I forgive you for 
the ruin you have brought upon our fondest hopes, and the 
agony with which you have torn the hearts of those who more 
than life loved him of whom you falsely called yourself the 
friend. But I fear you have already gone too far ever to feel 
your need of that forgiveness which alone can avail you. Yet 
I say — Eepent, for the mercy of the Lord is infinite. Though 
my boy is lost to me forever, I should yet rejoice to see the 
instrument of his ruin plucked as a brand from the burning. 

“Your obedient weU-wisher, 

“Charles Osborne. 

“ P. S. — I retain your letter for the sake of my less expert 
enced brethren, that I may be able to afibrd an instance of 
how far the unregenerate mind can go in its antagonism to the 
God of Revelation.” 

I breathed a deep breath, and laid the letter down, mainly 
concerned as to whether Mary had had the chance of reading 
mine. I could believe any amount of tyranny in her father — 
even to perusing and withholding her letters; but in this I 
may do him injustice, for there is no common ground known 
to me from which to start in speculating upon his probable 
actions. I wrote in answer something nearly as follows : — 

“ Sir — ^That you should do me injustice can by this time be 
no matter of surprise to me. Had I the slightest hope of con- 
vincing you of the fact, I should strain every mental nerve to 
that end. But no one can labor without hope, and as in 
respect of your justice I have none, I will be silent. May the 
God in whom I trust convince you of the cruelty of which you 
have been guilty; the God in whom you profess to believe, 


ATTEMPTS AND COINCIDENCES. 


435 


must be too like yourself to give any ground of such hope 
from him. 

“ Your obedient servant, 

“ Wilfrid Cumbermede,” 

If Mary had read my letter, I felt assured her reading had 
been very different from her father’s. Anyhow she could not 
judge me as he did, for she knew me better. She knew that 
for Charley’s sake I had tried the harder to believe myself. 

But the reproaches of one who had been so unjust to his 
own son could not weigh very heavily on me, and I now 
resumed my work with a tolerable degree of calmness. But I 
wrote badly. I should have done better to go down to the 
Moat, and be silent. If my reader has ever seen what I wrote 
at that time, I should like her to know that I now wish it all 
unwritten — ^not for any utterance contained in it, but simply 
for its general inferiority. 

Certainly, work is not always required of a man. There is 
such a thing as a sacred idleness, the cultivation of which is 
now fearfully neglected. Abraham, seated in his tent-door in 
the heat of the day, would be to the philosophers of the nine- 
teenth century an object for uplifted hands and pointed fingers. 
They would see in him only the indolent Arab, whom nothing 
but the foolish fancy that he saw his Maker in the distance 
could rouse to run. 

It was clearly better to attempt no further communication 
with Mary at present ; and I could think but of one person 
from whom, without giving pain, I might hope for some infor- 
mation concerning her. * * * 

Here I had written a detailed account of how I contrived to 
meet Miss Pease, but it is not of consequence enough to my 
story to be allowed to remain. Suffice it to mention that one 
morning, at length, I caught sight of her in a street in May- 
fair, where the family was then staying for the season, and 
overtaking, addressed her. 

She started, stared at me for a moment, and held out hei 
hand. 


436 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


“ I didn’t know you, Mr. Cumbermede. How much older 
you look I I beg your pardon. Have you been ill ? ” 

She spoke hurriedly, and kept looking over her shoulder 
now and then as if afraid of being seen talking to me. 

“ I have had a good deal to make me older since we met 
last. Miss Pease,” I said. “ I have hardly a friend left in the 
world but you — that is, if you will allow me to call you one.” 

“Certainly, certainly,” she answered, but hurriedly, and 
with one of those uneasy glances. “Only you must allow, 
Mr. Cumbermede, that — that — that — ” 

The poor lady was evidently unprepared to meet me on the 
old footing, and, at the same time, equally unwilling to hurt 
my feelings. 

“ I should be sorry to make you run any risk for my sake,” 
I said. “ Please just answer me one question. Do you know 
what it is to be misunderstood — to be despised without deserv- 
ing it?” 

She smiled sadly, and nodded her head gently two or three 
times. 

“ Then have pity on me and let me have a little talk with 
you.” 

Again she glanced apprehensively over her shoulder. 

“ You are afraid of being seen with me, and I don’t wonder,” 
I said. 

“ Mr. Geoffrey came up with us,” she answered. “ I left 
him at breakfast. He will be going across the park to his 
club directly.” 

“ Then come with me the other way — ^into Hyde Park,” I 
said. 

With evident reluctance, she yielded and accompanied me. 

As soon as we got within Stanhope Gate, I spoke. 

“ A certain sad event, of which you have no doubt heard. 
Miss Pease, has shut me out from all communication with the 
family of my friend, Charley Osborne. I am very anxious 
for some news of his sister. She is all that is left of him to 
me now. Can you tell me anything about her ?” 

“ She has been very ill,” she replied. 


ATTEMPTS AND COINCIDENCES. 


437 


“ I hope that means that she is better,” I said. 

“ She is better, and, I hear, going on the continent, as soon 
as the season will permit. But, Mr. Cumbermede, you must 
be aware that I am under considerable restraint in talking to 
you. The position I hold in Sir Giles’s family, although 
neither a comfortable nor a dignified one ” 

“ I understand you perfectly. Miss Pease,” I returned, “ and 
fully appreciate the sense of propriety which causes your em- 
barrassment. But the request I am about to make has nothing 
to do with them or their afiairs whatever. I only want your 
promise to let me know if you hear anything of Miss Osborne.” 

“ I cannot tell — what ” 

“ What use I may be going to make of the information you 
give me. In a word, you do not trust me.” 

“ I neither trust nor distrust you, Mr. Cumbermede. But I 
am afraid of being drawn into a correspondence with you.” 

“ Then I will ask no promise. I will hope in your gene- 
rosity. Here is my address. I pray you, as you would have 
helped him who fell among thieves, to let me know anything 
you hear about Mary Osborne.” 

She took my card, and turned at once, saying : 

“ Mind, I make no promise.” 

“ I imagine none,” I answered. “ I will trust in your kind- 
ness.” 

And so we parted. 

Unsatisfactory as the interview was, it yet gave me a little 
hope. I was glad to hear Mary was going abroad, for it must 
do her good. For me, I would endure and labor and hope. 
I gave her to God, as Shakspeare says somewhere, and set 
myself to my work. When her mind was quieter about 
Charley, somehow or other I might come near her again. I 
could not see how. 

I took my way across the Green Park. 

I do not believe we notice the half of the coincidences that 
float past us on the stream of events. Things which would 
fill us with astonishment, and probably with foreboding, look 
us in the face and pass us by, and we know nothing of them. 


438 


WILFRID OUMBERMEDE. 


As I walked along in the direction of the Mall, I became 
aware of a tall man coming towards me, stooping as if with 
age, while the length of his stride indicated a more vigorous 
period. He passed without lifting his head, but in the partial 
view of the wan and furrowed countenance I could not fail to 
recognize Charley’s father. Such a worn unhappiness was 
there depicted, that the indignation which still lingered in my 
bosom went out in compassion. If his sufferings might but 
teach him that to brand the truth of the kingdom with tho 
private mark of opinion must result in persecution and cruelty I 
He mounted the slope with strides at once eager and aimless, 
and I wondered whether any of the sure coming compunctions 
had yet begun to overshadow the complacency of his faith; 
whether he had yet begun to doubt if it pleased the Son of 
Man that a youth should be driven from the gates of truth 
because he failed to recognize her image in the face of the 
janitors. 

Aimless also, I turned into the Mall, and again I started at 
the sight of a known figure. Was it possible? — could it be my 
Lilith betwixt the shafts of a public cabriolet ? Fortunately 
it was empty. I hailed it, and jumped up, telling the driver 
to take me to my chambers. My poor Lilith I She was work- 
ing like one who had never been loved ! So far as I knew, 
she had never been in harness before. She was badly groomed 
and thin, but much of her old spirit remained. I soon entered 
into negotiations with the driver, whose property she was, and 
made her my own once more, with a delight I could ill-ex- 
press in plain prose — for my friends were indeed few. I wish 
I could draw a picture of the lovely creature, when at length, 
having concluded my bargain, I approached her, and called 
her by her name I She turned her head sideways towards me 
with a low whinny of pleasure, and when I walked a little 
away, walked wearily after me. I took her myself to livery- 
stables near me, and wrote for Styles. His astonishment when 
he saw her was amusing. 

“ Good Lord, Miss Lilith I” was all he could say for some 
moments. 


ATTEMPTS AND COINCIDENCES. 


439 


In a few days she had begun to look like herself, and I sent 
her home with Styles. I should hardly like to say how much 
the recovery of her did to restore my spirits ; I could not help 
regarding it as a good omen. 

And now, the first bitterness of my misery having died a 
natural death, I sought again some of the friends I had made 
through Charley, and experienced from them great kindness. 
I began also to go into society a little, for I had found that 
invention is ever ready to lose the forms of life if it be not 
kept under the ordinary pressure of its atmosphere. As it is, 
I doubt much if any of my books are more than partially 
true to those forms, for I have ever heeded them too little ; 
but I believe I have been true to the heart of man. At the 
same time, I have ever regarded that heart more as the foun- 
tain of aspiration than the grave of fruition. The discom- 
fiture of enemies and a happy marriage never seemed to me 
ends of sufficient value to close a history withal — I mean a 
fictitious history, wherein one may set forth joys and sorrows 
which in a real history must walk shadowed under the veil of 
modesty ; for the soul still less than the body will consent to 
be revealed to all eyes. Hence, although most of my books 
have seemed true to some, they have all seemed visionary to 
most. 

A year passed away, during which I never left Lon- 
don. I heard from Miss Pease — that Miss Osborne, though 
much better, was not going to return until after another 
winter. I wrote and thanked her, and heard no more. It 
may seem I accepted such ignorance with strange indifierence ; 
but even to the reader, for whom alone I am writing, I cannot, 
as things are, attempt to lay open all my heart. I have not 
written, and cannot write, how I thought, projected, brooded, 
and dreamed — all about her; how I hoped when I wrote that 
she might read ; how I questioned what I had written, to find 
whether it would look to her what I had intended it to ap- 
pear. 


440 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER LVI. 

THE LAST VISION. 

I HAD engaged to accompany one of Charley^s barrister 
friends, in whose society I had found considerable satisfaction, 
to his father’s house, to spend the evening with some friends 
of the family. The gathering was chiefly for talk, and was a 
kind of thing I disliked, finding its aimlessness and flicker 
depressing. Indeed, partly from the peculiar circumstances 
of my childhood, partly from what I had sufiered, I always 
found my spirits highest when alone. Still, the study of hu- 
manity apart, I felt that I ought not to shut myself out from 
my kind, but endure some little irksomeness, if only for the 
sake of keeping alive the surface friendliness which has its 
value in the nourishment of the deeper afiections. On this 
particular occasion, however, I yielded the more willingly that, 
in the revival of various memories of Charley, it had occurred 
to me that I once heard him say that his sister had a regard 
for one of the ladies of the family. 

There were not many people in the drawing-room when we 
arrived, and my friend’s mother alone was there to entertain 
them. With her I was chatting when one of her daughters 
entered, accompanied by a lady in mourning. For one mo- 
ment I felt as if on the borders of insanity. My brain seemed 
to surge like the waves of a wind-tormented tide, so that I 
dared not make a single step forward lest my limbs should 
disobey me. It was, indeed, Mary Osborne; but oh, how 
changed ! The rather full face had grown delicate and thin, 
and the fine pure complexion if possible finer and purer, but 
certainly more ethereal and evanescent. It was as if suffering 
had remoye4 some substance unapt,* and rendered her body 

* Spenser’s " Hymne in Honor of Beautie.” 


THE LAST VISION. 


441 


a better-fitting garment for ber soul. Her face, which had 
before required the softening influence of sleep and dreams to 
give it the plasticity necessary for complete expression, was 
now full of a repressed expression, if I may be allowed the 
phrase —a latent something ever on the tremble, ever on the 
point of breaking forth. It was as if the nerves had grown 
finer, more tremulous, or rather, more vibrative. Touched to 
finer issues they could never have been, but sufiering had 
given them a more responsive thrill. In a word, she was the 
Athanasia of my dream, not the Mary Osborne of the Mold- 
warp library. 

Conquering myself at last, and seeing a favorable oppor- 
tunity, I approached her. I think the fear lest her father 
should enter gave me the final impulse ; otherwise I could have 
been contented to gaze on her for hours in motionless silence. 

“ May I speak to you, Mary V’ I said. 

She lifted her eyes and her whole face towards mine, with- 
out a smile, without a word. Her features remained perfectly 
still, but, like the outbreak of a fountain, the tears rushed into 
her eyes and overflowed in silent weeping. Not a sob, not a 
convulsive movement accompanied their flow. 

“ Is your father here?” I asked. 

She shook her head. 

“ I thought you were abroad somewhere — I did not know 
where.” 

Again she shook her head. She dared not speak, knowing 
that if she made the attempt she must break down. 

“ I will go away till you can bear the sight of me,” I said. 

She half-stretched out a thin white hand, but whether to 
detain me or bid me farewell, I do not know, for it dropped 
again on her knee. 

“ I will come to you by and by,” I said, and moved away. 

The rooms rapidly filled, and in a few minutes I could not 
see the corner where I had left her. I endured everything 
for a while, and then made my way back to it ; but she was 
gone, and I could find her nowhere. A lady began to sing. 
When the applause which followed her performance was over, 


442 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


my friend, who happen^ to be near me, turned abruptly and 
said, 

“ Now, Cumbermede, you sing.” 

The truth was, that since I had loved Mary Osborne, I had 
attempted to cultivate a certain small gift of song which I 
thought I possessed. I dared not touch any existent music, 
for I was certain I should break down ; but having a faculty 
• — somewhat thin, I fear — for writing songs, and finding that a 
shadowy air always accompanied the birth of the words, I had 
presumed to study music a little, in the hope of becoming 
able to fix the melody — the twin sister of the song. I had 
made some progress, and had grown able to write down a 
simple thought. There was little presumption, then, in 
venturing my voice, limited as was its scope, upon a trifle of 
my own. Tempted by the opportunity of realizing hopes con- 
sciously wild, I obeyed my friend, and, sitting down to the 
instrument in some trepidation, sang the following verses : — 

I dreamed that I woke from a dream, 

And the house was full of light j 

At the window two angel Sorrows 
Held back the curtains of night. 

The door was wide, and the house 
Was full of the morning windj 

At the door two armed warders 
Stood silent, with faces blind. 

I ran to the open door. 

For the wind of the world was sweet j 

The warders with crossing weapons 
Turned back my issuing feet. 

I ran to the shining windows— 

There the winged Sorrows stood; 

Silent they held the curtains, 

And the light fell through in a flood. 


I clomb to the highest window — 
Ah ! there, with shadowed brow, 
Stood one lonely radiant Sorrow, 
And that, my love, was thou. 


THE LAST VISION. 


443 


I could not have sung this in public but that no one would 
suspect it was my own, or was in the least likely to understand 
a word of it — except her for whose ears and heart it was 
intended. 

As soon as I had finished, I rose and once more went 
searching for Mary. But as I looked, sadly fearing she was 
gone, I heard her voice close behind me. 

“ Aj-e those verses your own, Mr. Cumbermede?” she asked, 
almost in a whisper. 

I turned trembling. Her lovely face was looking up at me. 

“Yes,” I answered — “as much my own as that I believe 
they are not to be found anywhere. But they were given to 
me rather than made by me.” 

“Would you let me have them? I am not sure that I 
understand them.” 

“ I am not sure that I understand them myself. They are 
for the heart rather than the mind. Of course you shall have 
them. They were written for you. AJl I have, all I am, is 
yours.” 

Her face flushed and grew pale again instantly. 

“ You must not talk so,” she said. “ Remember.” 

“ I can never forget. I do not know why you say remem^ 

“ On second thoughts, I must not have the verses* I beg 
your pardon.” 

“ Mary, you bewilder me. I have no right to ask you to 
explain, except that you speak as if I must understand. 
What have they been telling you about me ?” 

“ Nothing — at least nothing that ” 

She paused. 

“ I try to live innocently, and were it only for your sake, 
shall never stop searching for the thread of life in its raveled 
skein.” 

“ Do not say for my sake, Mr. Cumbermede. That means 
nothing. Say for your own sake, if not for God’s.” 

“ If you are going to turn away from me, I don’t mind how 
soon I follow Charley.” 


444 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


All this was said in a half whisper, I bending towards het 
where she sat, a little sheltered by one of a pair of folding- 
doors. My heart was like to break — or rather it seemed to 
have vanished out of me altogether, lost in a gulf of empti- 
ness. Was this all? Was this the end of my dreaming? To 
be thus pushed aside by the angel of my resurrection ? 

“ Hush ! hush !” she said kindly. “ You must have many 
friends. But 

“ But you will be my friend no more ? Is that it, Mary ? 
Oh, if you knew all ! And you are never, never to know it !” 

Her still face was once more streaming with tears. I 
choked mine back, terrified at the thought of being observed ; 
and without even ofiering my hand, left her and made my way 
through the crowd to the stair. On the landing I met Greof- 
frey Brotherton. We stared each other in the face, and 
passed. 

I did not sleep much that night, and when I did sleep, 
woke from one wretched dream after another, now crying 
aloud, and now weeping. What could I have done? Or, 
rather, what could any one have told her I had done, to make 
her behave thus to me ? She did not look angry — nor even 
displeased — only sorrowftil, very sorrowful ; and she seemed to 
take it for granted I knew what it meant. When at length I 
finally woke, after an hour of less troubled sleep, I found some 
difficulty in convincing myself that the real occurrence of the 
night before had not been one of the many troubled dreams 
that had scared my repose. Even after the dreams had all 
vanished, and the facts remained, they still appeared more like 
a dim dream of the dead — the vision of Mary was so wan and 
hopeless, memory alone looking out from her worn counte- 
nance. There had been no warmth in her greeting, no resent- 
ment in her aspect ; we met as if we had parted but an hour 
before, only that an open grave was between us, across which 
we talked in the voices of dreamers. She had sought to raise 
no barrier between us, just because we could not meet, save as 
one of the dead and one of the living. What could it mean ? 
But with the growing day awoke a little courage. I would at 


THE LAST VISION. 


445 

least try to find out what it meant. Surely aU my dreams 
were not to vanish like the mist of the morning! To lose my 
dreams would be far worse than to lose the so-called realities 
of life. What were these to me ? What value lay in such 
reality ? Even God was as yet so dim and far oflT as to seem 
rather in the region of dreams — of those true dreams, I 
hoped, that shadow forth the real— than in the actual visible 
present. “ Still,” I said to myself, “ she had not cast me off; 
she did not refuse to know me ; she did ask for my song, and 
I will send it.” 

I wrote it out, adding a stanza to the verses 

I bowed my head before her. 

And stood trembling in the light; 

She dropped the heavy curtain, 

And the house was full of night. 

I then sought my friend’s chambers. 

“ I was not aware you knew the Osbornes,” I said. “ I 
wonder you never told me, seeing Charley and you were such 
friends.” 

“ I never saw one of them till last night. My sister and 
she knew each other some time ago, and have met again of 
late. What a lovely creature she is 1 But what became of 
you last night? You must have left before any one else.” 

« I didn’t feel well.” 

“ You don’t look the thing.” 

“ I confess meeting Miss Osborne rather upset me.” 

“ It had the same effect on her. She was quite ill, my sister 
said this morning. No wonder 1 Poor Charley I I always 
had a painful feeling that he would come to grief somehow.” 

“ Let’s hope he’s come to something else by this time, Mars- 
ton,” I said. 

“ Amen,” he returned. 

‘‘ Is her father or mother with her ?” 

“No. They are to fetch her away — next week, I think it is.” 

I had now no fear of my communication falling into other 
hands, and therefore sent the song by post, with a note, in 
which I begged her to let me know if I had done anything to 


446 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDR. 


offend her. Next morning I received the following reply 
“No, Wilfrid— for Charley’s sake, I must call you by your 
name — you have done nothing to offend me. Thank you for 
the song. I did not want you to send it, but I will keep it. 
You must not write to me again. Do not forget what we 
used to write about. God s ways are not ours. Your friend, 

“ Mary Osborne.” 

I rose and went out, not knowing whither. Half-stunned, I 
roamed the streets. I ate nothing that day, and when towards 
night I found myself near my chambers, I walked in as I had 
come out, having no intent, no future. I felt very sick, and 
threw myself on my bed. There I passed the night, half in 
sleep, half in a helpless prostration. When I look back, it 
seems as if some spiritual narcotic must have been given me, 
else how should the terrible time have passed and left me 
alive? When I came to myself, I found I was ill, and I 
longed to hide my head in the nest of my childhood. I had 
always looked on the Moat as my refuge at the last ; now it 
seemed the only desirable thing — a lonely nook, in which to 
lie down and end the dream there begun — either, as it now 
seemed, in an eternal sleep, or the in burst of a dreary light. 
After the last refuge it could afford me it must pass from my 
hold ; but I was yet able to determine whither. I rose and 
went to Marston. 

“Marston,” I said, “ I want to make my will.” 

“ All right !” he returned ; “ but you look as if you meant 
to register it as well. You’ve got a feverish cold : I see it in 
your eyes. Come along. I’ll go home with you, and fetch a 
friend of mine who will give you something to do you good.” 

“ I can’t rest till I have made my will,” I persisted. 

“Well, there’s no harm in that,” he rejoined. “It won’t 
take long, I dare say.” 

“ It needn’t, anyhow. I only want to leave the small real 
property I have to Miss Osborne, and the still smaller personal 
property to yourself.” 

He laughed. 

“All right, old boy! I haven’t the slightest objection to 


S' S' 


THE LAST VISION. 


447 


your -willing your traps to me, but every objection in the world 
your leaving them. To be sure, every man, with anything 
leave, ought to make his will betimes ; — so fire away.” 

In a little while the draught was finished. 

‘‘ I shall have it ready for your signature by to-morrow,” 
he said. 

I insisted it should be done at once. I was going home, I 
said. He yielded. The will was engrossed, signed, and wit- 
nessed that same morning ; and in the afternoon I set out, the 
first part of the journey by rail, for the Moat. 


448 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER LVII. 

ANOTHER DREAM. 

The excitement of having something to do had helped me 
over the morning, and the pleasure of thinking of what I had 
done helped me through the journey ; but before I reached 
home I was utterly exhausted. Then I had to drive round 
by the farm, and knock up Mrs. Herbert and Styles. 

I could not bear the thought of my own room, and ordered 
a fire in my grandmother’s, where they soon got me into bed. 
All I remember of that night is the following dream. 

I found myself at the entrance of the ice cave. A burning 
sun beat on my head, and at my feet flowed the brook which 
gathered its life from the decay of the ice. I stooped to 
drink ; but, cool to the eye and hand and lips, it yet burned 
me within like fire. I would seek shelter from the sun inside 
the cave. I entered, and knew that the cold was all aroimd 
me ; I even felt it ; but somehow it did not enter into me. 
My brain, my very bones, burned with fire. I went in and in. 
The blue atmosphere closed around me, and the color entered 
into my soul till it seemed dyed with the potent blue. My 
very being swam and floated in a blue atmosphere of its own. 
My intention — I can recall it perfectly — was but to walk to 
the end, a few yards, then turn and again brave the sun ; for 
I had a dim feeling of forsaking my work, of playing truant, 
or of being cowardly in thus avoiding the heat. Something 
else, too, was wrong, but I could not clearly tell what. As I 
went on, I began to wonder that I had not come to the end. 
The gray walls yet rose about me, and even the film of disso- 
lution flowed along their glassy faces to the runnel below; 
still before me opened the depth of blue atmosphere, deep- 
ening as I went. After many windings the path began to 
branch, and soon I was lost in a labyrinth of passages, of 


ANOTHER DREAM. 


449 


which I knew not why I should choose one rather than 
another. It was useless now to think of returning. Arbi- 
trarily I chose the narrowest way, and still went on. 

A discoloration of the ice attracted my attention, and as I 
looked it seemed to retreat into the solid mass. There was 
something not ice within it which grew more and more distinct 
as I gazed, until at last I plainly distinguished the form of 
my grandmother, lying as then when my aunt made me touch 
her face. A few yards further on lay the body of my uncle, 
as I saw him in his coffin. His face was dead white in the 
midst of the cold, clear ice, his eyes closed, and his arms 
straight by his sides. He lay like an alabaster king upon his 
tomb. It was he, I thought, but he would never speak to me 
more — never look at me— never more awake. There lay all 
that was left of him — the cold frozen memory of what he had 
been and would never be again. I did not weep. I only 
knew somehow in my dream that life was all a wandering in 
a frozen cave, where the faces of the living were dark with 
the coming corruption, and the memories of the dead, cold 
and clear and hopeless evermore, alone were lovely. 

I walked further ; for the ice might possess yet more of the 
past — all that was left me of life. And again I stood and 
gazed, for, deep within, I saw the form of Charley — at rest 
now^ his face bloodless, but not so death-like as my uncle’s. 
His hands were laid palm to palm over his bosom, and pointed 
upwards as if praying for comfort where comfort was none : 
here at least were no flickerings of the rainbow fancies of 
faith and hope and charity ! I gazed in comfortless content 
for a time on the repose of my weary friend, and then went 
on, only moved to see what further the ice of the godless region 
might hold. Nor had I wandered far when I saw the form 
of Mary, lying like the rest, only that her hands were crossed 
on her bosom. I stood, wondering to find myself so little 
moved. But when the ice drew nigh me, and would have 
closed around me, my heart leaped for joy ; and when the 
heat of my lingering life repelled it, my heart sunk within 
me, and I said to myself : “ Death will not have me. I may 
29 


450 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


not join her even in the land of cold forgetfulness : I may 
not even be nothing with her.” The tears began to flow down 
my face, like the thin vail of water that kept ever flowing 
down the face of the ice ; and as I wept, the water before me 
flowed faster and faster, till it rippled in a sheet down the 
icy wall. Faster and yet faster it flowed, falling, with the 
sound as of many showers, into the runnel below, which 
rushed splashing and gurgling away from the foot of the 
vanishing wail. Faster and faster it flowed, until the solid 
mass fell in a foaming cataract, and swept in a torrent across 
the cave. I followed the retreating wall through the seething 
water at its foot. Thinner and thinner grew the dividing 
mass ; nearer and nearer came the form of my Maxy. “ I 
shall yet clasp her,” I cried; “her dead form will kill me, 
and I too shall be enclosed in the friendly ice. I shall not be 
with her, alas ; but neither shall I be without her, for I shall 
depart into the lovely nothingness.” Thinner and thinner 
grew the dividing wall. The skirt of her shroud hung like a 
wet weed in the falling torrent. I kneeled in the river, and 
crept nearer, with outstretched arms : when the vanishing ice 
set the dead form free, it should rest in those arms — the last 
gift of the life-dream — for then, surely, I must die. “ Let me 
pass in the agony of a lonely embrace !” I cried. As I spoke 
she moved. I started to my feet, stung into life by the agony 
of a new hope. Slowly the ice released her, and gently she 
rose to her feet. The torrents of water ceased — they had 
flowed but to set her free. Her eyes were still closed, but she 
made one blind step towards me, and laid her left hand on my 
head, her right hand on my heart. Instantly, body and soul, 
I was cool as a summer eve after a thunder-shower. For a 
moment, precious as an seon, she held her hands upon me — 
then slowly opened her eyes. Out of them flashed the living 
soul of my Athanasia. She closed the lids again slowly over 
the lovely splendor ; the water in which we stood rose around 
us, and on its last billow she floated away through the 
winding passage of the cave. I sought to follow her, but 
could not. I cried aloud and awoke. 


ANOTHER DREAM. 


451 


But the burning heat had left me ; I felt that I had passed 
a crisis, and had begun to recover — a conviction which would 
have been altogether unwelcome, but for the poor shadow of a 
reviving hope which accompanied it. Such a dream, come 
whence it might, could not but bring comfort with it. The 
hope grew, and was my sole medicine. 

Before the evening I felt better, and though still very 
feeble, managed to write to Marston, letting him know I was 
safe, and requesting him to forward any letters that might 
arrive. 

The next day I rose, but was unable to work. The very 
thought of writing sickened me. Neither could I bear the 
thought of returning to London. I tried to read, but threw 
aside book after book, without being able to tell what one of 
them was about. If for a moment I seemed to enter into the 
subject, before I reached the bottom of the page I found I had 
not an idea as to what the words meant or whither they tended. 
After many failures, unwilling to give myself up to idle brood- 
ing, I fortunately tried some of the mystical poetry of the 
seventeenth century : the difficulties of that I found to rather 
stimulate than repel me ; while, much as there was in the form 
to displease the taste, there was more in the matter to rouse 
the intellect. I found also some relief in resuming my mathe- 
matical studies : the abstraction of them acted as an anodyne. 
But the days dragged wearily. 

As soon as I was able to get on horseback, the tone of mind 
and body began to return. I felt as if into me some sort of 
animal healing passed from Lilith ; and who can tell in 
how many ways the lower animals may not minister to the 
higher ? 

One night I had a strange experience. I give it without 
argument, perfectly aware that the fact may be set down to the 
disordered state of my physical nature, and that without injus- 
tice. 

I had not for a long time thought about one of the questions 
which had so much occupied Charley and myself— that of 
immortality. As to any communication between the parted, 


452 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


I had never, during his life, pondered the possibility of it, 
although I had always had an inclination to believe that such 
intercourse had in rare instances taken place : former periods 
of the world’s history, when that blinding self-consciousness 
which is the bane of ours was yet undeveloped, must, I 
thought, have been far more favorable to its occurrence. 
Anyhow I was convinced that it was not to be gained by 
effort. I confess that, in the unthinking agony of grief after 
Charley’s death, many a time when I woke in the middle of 
the night and could sleep no more, I sat up in bed and prayed 
him, if he heard me, to come to me, and let me tell him the 
truth — for my sake to let me know at least that he lived, for 
then I should be sure that one day all would be well. But if 
there was any hearing, there was no answer. Charley did not 
come ; the prayer seemed to vanish in the darkness ; and my 
more self-possessed meditations never justified the hope of any 
such being heard. 

One night I was sitting in my grannie’s room, which, except 
my uncle’s, was now the only one I could bear to enter. I 
had been reading for some time very quietly, but had leaned 
back in my chair, and let my thoughts go wandering whither 
they would, when all at once I was possessed by the conviction 
that Charley was near me. I saw nothing, heard nothing ; of 
the recognized senses of humanity not one gave me a hint of a 
presence ; and yet my whole body was aware — so at least it 
seemed — of the proximity of another L It was as if some 
nervous region commensurate with my frame were now for the 
first time revealed by contact with an object suitable for its 
apprehension. Like Eliphaz, I felt the hair of my head stand 
^ot from terror, but simply, as it seemed, from the pres- 
ence and its strangeness. Like others also of whom I have 
read, who believed themselves in the presence of the disem- 
bodied, I could not speak. I tried, but as if the medium for 
sound had been withdrawn, and an empty gulf lay around me, 
no word followed, although my very soul was full of the cry — 
Charley ! Charley ! And alas ! in a few moments, like the 
faint vanishing of an unrealized thought, leaving only the 


A1T0THEE DREAM. 


m 


assurance that something half-born from out of the unknown 
had been there, the influence faded and died. It passed from 
me like the shadow of a cloud, and once more I knew but my 
poor lonely self, returning to its candles, its open book, its 
burning fire. 


WILFRID CUMBEEMUDE. 


4.*)4 


CHAPTEK LVIII. 

THE DARKEST HOUR. 

Suffering is perhaps the only preparation for suffering : 
till I was but poorly prepared for what followed. 

Having gathered strength, and a certain quietness which I 
could not mistake for peace, I returned to London towards the 
close of the spring. I had in the interval heard nothing of 
Mary. The few letters Marston had sent on had been almost 
exclusively from my publishers. But the very hour I reached 
my lodging, came a note, which I opened trembling, for it was 
in the handwriting of Miss Pease. 

“ Dear sir, I cannot, I think, be wrong in giving you a 
piece of information which will be in the newspapers to-mor- 
row morning. Your old acquaintance, and my young rela- 
tive, Mr. Brotherton, was married this morning, at St. George’s, 
Hanover Square, to your late friend’s sister. Miss Mary 
Osborne. They have , just left for Dover on their way to 
Switzerland. 

“Your sincere well-wisher, 

“Jane Pease.” 

Even at this distance of time, I should have to exhort 
myself to write with calmness, were it not that the utter 
despair of conveying my feelings, if indeed my soul had not 
for the time passed beyond feeling into some abyss unknown 
to human consciousness, renders it unnecessary. This despair 
of communication has two sources — the one simply the con- 
viction of the impossibility of expressing any feeling, much 
more such feeling as mine then was — and is ; the other the con- 
viction that only to the heart of love can the sufferings of love 
speak. The attempt of a lover to move, by the presentation 
of his own suffering, the heart of her who loves him not, is as 


THE DARKEST HOUR. 


455 


unavailing as it is unmanly. The poet who sings most wail- 
fully of the torments of the lover’s hell, is but a sounding 
brass and a tinkling cymbal in the ears of her who has at best 
only a general compassion to meet the song withal — possibly 
only an individual vanity which crowns her with his woes as 
with the trophies of a conquest. True, he is understood and 
worshipped by all the other wailful souls in the first infernal 
circle, as one of the great men of their order — able to put into 
words full of sweet torment the dire hopelessness of their 
misery ; but for such the singer, singing only for ears eternally 
deaf to his song, cares nothing ; or if for a moment he receive 
consolation from their sympathy, it is but a passing weakness 
which the breath of an indignant self-condemnation — even 
contempt, the next moment sweeps away. In God alone there 
must be sympathy and cure ; but I had not then — have I 
indeed yet found what that cure is ? I am at all events now 
able to write with calmness. If suffering destroyed itself, as 
some say, mine ought to have disappeared long ago ; but to 
that I can neither pretend nor confess. 

For the first time, after all I had encountered, I knew what 
suffering could be. It is still at moments an agony as of hell 
to recall this and the other thought that then stung me like a 
white-hot arrow ; the shafts have long been drawn out, but the 
barbed heads are still there. I neither stormed nor maddsned. 
I only felt a freezing hand lay hold of my heart, and gripe it 
closer and closer till I should have sickened, but that the pain 
ever stung me into fresh life ; and ever since I have gone about 
the world with that hard lump somewhere in my bosom into 
which the griping hand and the griped heart have grown and 
stiffened. 

I fled at once back to my solitary house, looking for no 
relief in its solitude, only the negative comfort of escaping the 
eyes of men. I could not bear the sight of my fellow-crea- 
tures. To say that the world had grown black to me, is as 
nothing: I ceased — I will not say to believe in God, for I 
never dared say that mighty thing— but I ceased to hope in 
God. The universe had grown a negation which yet forced 


456 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


its presence upon me — a death that bred worms. If there were 
a God anywhere, this universe could be nothing more than his 
forsaken moth-eaten garment. He was a God who did not 
care. Order was all an invention of phosphorescent Imman 
brains ; light itself the mocking smile of a Jupiter over his 
writhing sacrifices. At times I laughed at the tortures of my 
own heart, saying to it, “Writhe on, worm; thou deservest 
thy writhing in that thou writhest. Godless creature, why 
dost thou not laugh with me ? Am I not merry over thee and 
the world — in that ye are both rottenness to the core?’’ The 
next moment my heart and I would come together with a 
shock, and I know it was myself that scorned myself. 

Such being my mood it will cause no surprise if I say that 
I too was tempted to suicide ; the wonder would have been if 
it had been otherwise. The soft keen curves of that fatal 
dagger, which had not only slain Charley but all my hopes — 
for had he lived this horror could not have been — grew almost 
lovely in my eyes. Until now it had looked cruel, fiendish, 
hateful : but now I would lay it before me and contemplate it, 
In some griefs there is a wonderful power of self-contempla- 
tion, which indeed forms their only solace ; the moment it can 
set the sorrow away from itself sufilciently to regard it, the 
tortured heart begins to repose ; but suddenly, like a waking 
tiger, the sorrow leaps again into its lair, and the agony com- 
mences anew. The dagger was the type of my grief and its 
torture : might it not, like the brazen serpent, be the cure for 
the sting of its living counterpart? But, alas! where was the 
certainty? Could I slaj rnyself f This outer breathing form 
I could dismiss — but the pain was not there. I was not mad, 
and I knew that a deeper death than that could give, at least 
than I had any assurance that could give, alone could bring 
repose. For, impossible as I had alway found it actually to 
believe in immortality, I now found it equally impossible to 
believe in annihilation. And even if annihilation should be 
the final result, who could tell but it might require ages of a 
horrible slow-decaying dream-consciousness, to kill the living 
thing which felt itself other than its body ? 


THE DARKEST HOUR. 


457 


Until now, I had always accepted what seemed the natural 
and universal repugnance to absolute dissolution, as the 
strongest argument on the side of immortality; — for why 
should a man shrink from that which belonged to his nature? 
But now annihilation seemed the one lovely thing, the one sole 
only lonely thought in which lay no blackness of burning 
darkness. Oh for one eternal unconscious sleep ! — the nearest 
likeness we can cherish of that inconceivable nothingness— 
ever denied by the very thinking of it— by the vain attempt 
to realize that whose very existence is the knowing nothing of 
itself! Could that dagger have insured me such repose, or 
had there been any draught of Lethe, utter Lethe, whose 
blessed poison would have assuredly dissipated like a fume 
this conscious, self-tormenting me, I should not now be writh- 
ing anew, as in the clutches of an old grief, clasping me like a 
corpse, stung to simulated life by the galvanic battery of recol- 
lection. Vivid as it seems — all I suffer as I write is but a faint 
phantasm of w'hat I then endured. 

I learned therefore that to some minds the argument for 
immortality drawn from the apparently universal shrinking 
from annihilation must be ineffectual, seeing they themselves 
do not shrink from it. Convince a man that there is no God 
— or, for I doubt if that be altogether possible — make it, I 
will say, impossible for him to hope in God — and it cannot be 
that annihilation should seem an evil. If there is no God, 
annihilation is the one thing to be longed for with all that 
might of longing which is the mainspring of human action. 
In a word, it is not immortality the human heart cries out after, 
but that immortal eternal thought whose life is its life, whose 
wisdom is its wisdom, whose ways and whose thoughts shall — 
must one day — become its ways and its thoughts. Dissociate 
immortality from the living Immortality and it is not a thing 
to be desired — not a thing that can on those terms, or even on 
the fancy of those terms, be desired. 

But such thoughts as these were far enough from me then. 

I lived because I despaired of death. I ate by a sort of blind 
animal instinct, and so lived. The time had been when I 


458 


WILFRIP CUMBERMEDE. 


would despise myself for being able to eat in the midst of emo< 
tion ; but now I cared so little for the emotion even, that eat- 
ing or not eating had nothing to do with the matter. I ate 
because meat was set before me; I slept because sleep came 
upon me. It was a horrible time. My life seemed only a ver- 
miculate one, a crawling about of half-thoughts, half-feelings 
through the corpse of a decaying existence. The heart of 
being was withdrawn from me, and my life was but the vacant 
pericardium in which it had once throbbed out and sucked in 
the red fountains of life and gladness. 

I would not be thought to have fallen to this all but bottom- 
less depth only because I had lost Mary. Still less was it be- 
cause of the fact that in her, around whom had gathered aU 
the devotion with which the man in me could regard woman, I 
had lost all womankind. It was the loss of Mary, as I then 
judged it, not, I repeat, the fact that Jhad lost her. It was 
that she had lost herself. Thence it was, I say, that I lost my 
hope in God. For, if there were a God, how could he let 
purity be clasped in the arms of defilement? how could he 
marry my Athanasia — not to a corpse, but to a Plague ? Here 
was the man who had done more to ruin her brother than any 
but her father, and God had given her to him / I had had — 
with the commonest of men — some notion of womanly purity 
— how was it that hers had not instinctively shuddered and 
shrunk ? how was it that the life of it had not taken refuge 
with death to shun bare contact with the coarse impurity of 
such a nature as that of Geofirey Brotherton ? My dreams 
had been dreams indeed ! Was my Athanasia dead, or had 
she never been ? In my thought, she had “ said to Corruption, 
Thou art my father ; to the worm, thou art my mother and 
my sister.” Who should henceforth say of any woman that 
she was impure ? She might love him — true ; but what was 
she then who was able to love such a man ? It was this that 
stormed the citadel of my hope, and drove me from even think- 
ing of a God. 

Gladly would I now have welcomed any bodily sufiering 
that could hide me from myself ; but no illness came. I was 


THE DARKEST HOUR. 


459 


a living pain, a conscious ill-being. In a thousand forms those 
questions would ever recur, but without hope of answer. 
When I fell asleep from exhaustion, hideous visions of her 
with Geoffrey would start me up with a great cry, sometimes 
with a curse on my lips. Nor were they the most horrible of 
tnose dreams in which she would help him to mock me. Once, 
and only once, I found myself dreaming the dream of that 
night, and I knew that I had dreamed it before Through 
palace and chapel and charnel house, I followed her, ever with 
a dim sense of awful result ; and when at last she lifted the 
shining veil, instead of the face of Athanada, the bare teeth 
of a skull grinned at me from under a spotted shroud, through 
which the sunlight shone from behind, revealing all its horrors. 
I was not mad — my reason had not given way : how remains a 
marveL 


460 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE, 


CHAPTER LIX. 

THE DAWN. 

All places were alike to me now — ^for tke universe was but 
one dreary chasm whence I could not escape. One evening I 
sat by the open window of my chamber, which looked towards 
those trees and that fatal Mold warp Hall. My suffering had 
now grown dull by its own excess, and I had moments of list- 
less vacuity, the nearest approach to peace I had yet experi- 
enced. It was a fair evening of early summer — but I was 
utterly careless of nature as of all beyond it. The sky was 
nothing to me — and the earth was all unlovely. There I sat, 
heavy, but free from torture ; a kind of quiet had stolen over 
me. I was roused by the tiniest breath of wind on my cheek, 
as if the passing wing of some butterfly had fanned me ; and 
on that faintest motion came a scent as from long-forgotten 
fields, a scent like as of sweet-peas or wild roses, but of neither : 
flowers were none nearer me than the gardens of the Hall. I 
started with a cry. It was the scent of the garments of my 
Athanasiay as I had dreamed it in my dream ! Whence that 
wind had borne it, who could tell ? but in the husk that had 
overgrown my being it had found a cranny, and through that 
cranny, with the scent. Nature entered. I looked up to the 
blue sky, wept, and for the first time fell on my knees. “ O 
God !” I cried, and that was all. But what are the prayers of 
the whole universe more than expansions of that one cry ? It 
is not what God can give us but God that we want. Call the 
whole thing fancy if you will ; it was at least no fancy that the 
next feeling of which I was conscious was compassion: from 
that moment I began to search heaven and earth and the soul 
of man and woman for excuses wherewith to clothe the idea 
of Mary Osborne. For weeks and weeks I pondered, and by 
degrees the following conclusions wrought themselves out in 
my brain : — 

That she had never seen life as a whole ; that her religious 


THE DAWN. 


461 


theories had ever been eating away and absorbing her life, so 
preventing her religion from interpenetrating and glorifying it; 
that in regard to certain facts and consequences she had been 
left to an ignorance which her innocence rendered profound ; 
that, attracted by the worldly splendor of the offer, her father 
and mother had urged her compliance, and, broken in spirit by 
the fate of Charley, and having always been taught that self< 
denial was in itself a virtue, she had taken the worldly desires 
of her parents for the will of God, and blindly yielded ; that 
Brotherton was capable, for his ends, of representing himself 
as possessed of religion enough to satisfy the scruples of her 
parents, and, such being satisfied, she had resisted her own as 
evil things. 

Whether his hatred of me had had any share in his desire 
to possess her, I hardly thought of inquiring. 

Of course I did not for a single moment believe that Mary 
had had the slightest notion of the bitterness, the torture, the 
temptation of Satan it would be to me. Doubtless the feeling 
of her father concerning the death of Charley had seemed to 
hollow an impassable gulf between us. Worn and weak, and 
not knowing what she did, my dearest friend had yielded her- 
self to the embrace of my deadliest foe. If he was such as I 
had too good reason for believing him, she was far more to be 
pitied than I. Lonely she must be — lonely as I — for who was 
there to understand and love her ? Bitterly too by this time 
she must have suffered, for the dove can never be at peace in 
the bosom of the vulture, or cease to hate the carrion of 
which he must ever carry about with him at least tne disgust- 
ing memorials. Alas ! I too had been her enemy, and had 
cried out against her ; but now I would love her more and 
better than ever ! Oh ! if I knew but something I could do 
for her, some service which on the bended knees of my spirit 
I might offer her I I clomb the heights of my grief, and 
looked abroad, but alas ! I was such a poor creature ! A dab- 
bler in the ways of the world, a writer of tales which even 
those who cared to read them counted fantastic and Utopian, 
who was I to weave a single silken thread into the web of her 


462 


WILFKID CUMBEKMEDE. 


life? How could I bear her one poorest service? Never in 
this world could I approach her near enough to touch yet once 
again the hem. of her garment. All I could do was to love 
her. No — I could and did suffer for her. Alas ! that suffer- 
ing was only for myselfj and could do nothing for her ! It was 
indeed some consolation to me that my misery came from her 
hand ; but if she knew it, it would but add to her pain. In 
my heart I could only pray her pardon for my wicked and 
selfish thoughts concerning her, and vow again and ever to 
regard her as my Athanasia. But yes ! there was one thing I 
could do for her : I would be a true man for her sake ; she 
should have some satisfaction in me ; I would once more arise 
and go to my Father. 

The instant the thought arose in my mind, I fell down 
before the possible God in an agony of weeping. All com- 
plaint of my own doom had vanished, now that I began to do 
her the justice of love. Why should I be blessed — here and 
now at least — according to my notions of blessedness ? Let 
the great heart of the universe do with me as it pleased ! Let 
the Supreme take his own time to justify himself to the heart 
that sought to love him ! I gave up myself, was willing to 
suffer, to be a living pain, so long as he pleased ; and the 
moment I yielded, half the pain was gone; I gave my Atha- 
nasia yet again to God, and all might yet, in some high, far- 
off, better-world-way, be well. I could wait and endure. If 
only God was, and was God, then it was, or would be, well 
with Mary — well with me ! 

But, as I still sat, a flow of sweet sad repentant thought 
passing gently through my bosom, all at once the self to which, 
unable to confide it to the care of its own very life, the God 
conscious of himself and in himself conscious of it, I had 
been for months offering the sacrifices of despair and indigna- 
tion, arose in spectral hideousness before me. I saw that I, a 
child of the infinite, had been worshipping the finite —and 
therein dragging down the infinite towards the fate of the finite. 
I do not mean that in Mary Osborne I had been worshipping 
the finite. It was the eternal, the lovely, the true that in her 


THE DAWN. 


463 


I had been worshipping: in myself I had been worshipping 
the mean, the selfish, the finite, the god of spiritual greed. 
Only in himself can a man find the finite to worship; only in 
turning back upon himself does he create the finite for and by 
his worship. All the works of God are everlasting ; the only 
perishable are some of the works of man. All love is a wor- 
ship of the infinite : what is called a man’s love for himself, is 
not love ; it is but a phantastic resemblance of love ; it is a 
creating of the finite, a creation of death. A man cannot love 
himself. If all love be not creation — as I think it is — it is at 
least the only thing in harmony with creation and the love of 
oneself is its absolute opposite. I sickened at the sight of 
myself : how should I ever get rid of the demon ? The same 
instant I saw the one escape: I must oflTer it back to its source 
— commit it to him who had made it. I must live no more 
from it, but from the source of it ; seek to know nothing more 
of it than he gave me to know by his presence therein. Thus 
might I become one with the Eternal in such an absorption as 
Buddha had never dreamed ; thus might I draw life ever 
fresh from its fountain. And in that fountain alone would I 
contemplate its reflex. What flashes of self-consciousness 
might cross me, should be God’s gift, not of my seeking, and 
offered again to him in ever new self sacrifice. Alas ! alas ! 
this I saw then, and this I yet see ; but oh, how far am I still 
from that divine annihilation I The only comfort is, God is, 
and I am his, else I should not be at all. 

I saw too that tlius God also lives— in his higher way. I 
saw, shadowed out in the absolute devotion of Jesus to men, 
that the very life of God by which we live is an everlasting 
eternal giving of himself away. He asserts himself, only, 
solely, altogether, in an infinite sacrifice of devotion. So must 
we live ; the child must be as the father ; live he cannot on 
any other plan, struggle as he may. The father requires of 
him nothing that he is not or does not himself, who is the one 
prime unconditioned sacrificer and sacrifice. I threw myself 
on the ground, and oflfered back my poor wretched self to its 
owner, to be taken and kept, purified and made divine. 


464 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


The same moment a sense of reviving health began to 
possess me. With many fluctuations, it has possessed me, has 
grown, and is now, if not a persistent cheerfulness, yet an 
unyielding hope. The world bloomed again around me. The 
sunrise again grew gloriously dear ; and the sadness of the 
moon was lighted from a higher sun than that which returns 
with the morning. 

My relation to Mary resolved and re-formed itself in my 
mind into something I can explain only by the following — 
call it dream ; it was not a dream ; call it a vision ; it was not 
a vision ; and yet I will tell it as if it were either, being far 
truer than either. 

I lay like a child on one of God’s arms. I could not see 
his face, and the arm that held me was a great cloudy arm. 
I knew that on his other arm lay Mary. But between us 
were forests and plains, mountains and great seas ; and, un- 
speakably worse than all, a gulf with which words had 
nothing to do, a gulf of pure separation, of impassable 
nothingness, across which no device, I say not of human skill, 
but of human imagination, could cast a single connecting cord. 
There lay Mary and here lay I — ^both in God’s arms — utterly 
parted. As in a swoon I lay, through which suddenly came 
the words : “ What God hath joined, man cannot sunder.” I 
lay thinking what they could mean. All at once I thought I 
knew. Straightway I rose on the cloudy arm, looked down 
on a measureless darkness beneath me, and up on a great, 
dreary, world-filled eternity above me, and crept along the 
arm towards the bosom of God. 

In telling my — neither vision nor dream nor ecstacy, I 
cannot help it that the forms grow so much plainer and more 
definite in the words than they were in the revelation. Words 
always give either too much or too little shape : when you 
want to be definite, you find your words clumsy and blunt ; 
when you want them for a vague shadowy image, you 
straightway find them give a sharp and impertinent outline, 
refusing to lend themselves to your undefined though vivid 
thought. Forms themselves are hard enough to manage, but 


THE DAWN. 465 

words are unmanageable. I must therefore trust to the heart 
of my reader. 

I crept into the bosom of Gud, and along a great cloudy 
peace, which I could not understand, for it did not yet enter 
into me. At length I came to the heart of God, and through 
that my journey lay. The moment I entered it, the great 
peace appeared to enter mine, and I began to understand it 
Something melted in my heart, and for a moment I thought 
I was dying, but I found I was being born again. My heart 
was empty of its old selfishness, and I loved Mary tenfold, nor 
longer in the least for my own sake, but all for her loveliness. 
The same moment I knew that the heart of God was a bridge, 
along which I was crossing the unspeakable eternal gulf that 
divided Mary and me. At length, somehow, I know not how, 
somewhere, I know not where, I was where she was. She 
knew nothing of my presence, turned neither face nor eye to 
meet me, stretched out no hand to give me the welcome of 
even a friend, and yet I not only knew, but felt that she was 
mine. I wanted nothing from her ; desired the presence of 
her loveliness only that I might know it ; hung about her life 
as the butterfly over the flower he loves ; was satisfied that 
she should he, I had left myself behind in the heart of God, 
and now I was a pure essence, fit to rejoice in the essential. 
But alas ! my whole being was not yet subject to its best. I 
began to long to be able to do something for her besides — I 
foolishly said beyond loving her. Back rushed my old self in 
the selfish thought : Some day — will she not know — and at 

least ? That moment the vision vanished. I was tossed 

— ah ! let me hope, only to the other arm of God — but I lay 
in torture yet again. For a man may see visions manifold, 
and believe them all ; and yet his faith shall not save him ; 
something more is needed — he must have that presence of God 
in his soul, of which the Son of Man spoke, saying : “If a 
man love me, he will keep my words : and my Father will love 
him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with 
him.” God in him, he will be able to love for very love’s 
sake ; God not in him, his best love will die into selfishness. 

30 


466 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER LX. 

MY GREAT-GRANDMOTHER. 

The morniDg then which had thus dawned upon me, was 
often over-clouded heavily. Yet it was the morning and not 
the night ; and one of the strongest proofs that it was the 
morning, lay in this, that again I could think in verse. 

One day, after an hour or two of bitterness, I wrote the 
following. A man’s trouble must have receded from him a 
little for the moment, if he describes any shape in it, so as to 
be able to give it form in words. I set it down with no hope 
of better than the vaguest sympathy. There came no music 
with this one. 

If it be that a man and a woman 
Are made for no mutual grief; 

That each gives the pain to some other. 

And neither can give the relief; 

If thus the chain of the world 
Is tied round the holy feet, 

I scorn to shrink from facing 
What my brothers and sisters meet. 

But I cry when the wolf is tearing 
At the core of my heart as now : 

When I was the man to be tortured. 

Why should the woman be thou f 

I am not so ready to sink from the lofty into the abject now. 
If at times I yet feel that the whole creation is groaning and 
travailing, I know what it is for — its redemption from the 
dominion of its own death into that sole liberty which comes 
only of being filled and eternally possessed by God himself, its 
•ource and its life. 

And now I found also that my heart began to be moved 


MY GREAT-GRANDMOTHER. 


467 


with a compassion towards my fellows such as I had never 
before experienced. I shall best convey what I mean by 
transcribing another little poem I wrote about the same time. 

Once I sat on a crimson throne, 

And I held the world in fee ; 

Below me I heard my brothers moan. 

And I bent me down to seej — 

Lovingly bent and looked on them, 

But / had no inward pain ; 

I sat in the heart of my ruby gem. 

Like a rainbow without the rain. 

My throne is vanished ; helpless I lie 
At the foot of its broken stair; 

And the sorrows of all humanity 

Through my heart make a thoroughfare. 

Let such things rest for a while: I have now to relate 
another incident — strange enough, but by no means solitary 
in the records of human experience. My reader will probably 
think that of dreams and visions there has already been more 
than enough ; but perhaps she will kindly remember that at 
this time I had no outer life at all. Whatever bore to me the 
look of existence was within me. All my days the tendency 
had been to an undue predominance of thought over action, 
and now that the springs of action were for a time dried up, 
what wonder was it if thought, lording it alone, should assume 
a reality beyond its right? Hence the life of the day was 
prolonged into the night; nor was there other than a small 
difference in their conditions, beyond the fact that their con- 
trast of outer things was removed in sleep ; whence the shapes 
which the waking thought had assumed, had space and oppor- 
tunity, as it were, to thicken before the mental eye until they 
became dreams and visions. 

But concerning what I am about to relate I shall offer no 
theory. Such mere operation of my own thoughts may be 
sufficient to account for it : I would only ask — does any one 
know what the mere operation of his own thoughts signifies ? 
I cannot isolate myself, especially in those moments when the 


468 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


individual vdll is less awake, from the ocean of life and thought 
which not only surrounds me, but on which I am in a sense 
one of the floating bubbles. 

I was asleep, but I thought I lay awake in bed — in the room 
where I still slept — that which had been my grannie’s. — It 
was dark midnight, and the wind was howling about the gable 
and in the chimneys. The door opened, and some one entered. 
By the lamp she carried I knew my great-grandmother — -just 
as she looked in life, only that now she walked upright and 
with ease. That I was dreaming is plain from the fact that I 
felt no surprise at seeing her. 

Wilfrid, come with me,” she said, approaching the bedside. 
“Rise.” 

I obeyed like a child. 

“ Put your cloak on,” she continued, “ It is a stormy mid- 
night, but we have not so far to go as you may think.” 

“ I think nothing, grannie,” I said. “ I do not know where 
you want to take me.” 

“ Come and see then, my son. You must at last learn what 
has been kept from you far too long.” 

As she spoke, she led the way down the stair, through the 
kitchen, and out into the dark night. I remember the wind 
blowing my cloak about, but I remember nothing more until 
I found myself in the winding hazel-walled lane, leading to 
XJmberden Church. My grannie was leading me by one 
withered hand ; in the other she held the lamp, over the 
flame of which the wind had no power. She led me into the 
churchyard, took the key from under the tombstone, unlocked 
the door of the church, put the lamp into my hand, pushed 
me gently in, and shut the door behind me. I walked to the 
vestry, and set the lamp on the desk, with a vague feeling that 
I had been there before, and that I had now to do something 
at this desk. Above it I caught sight of the row of vellum- 
bound books, and remembered that one of them contained 
something of importance to me. I took it down. The 
moment I opened it, I remembered with distinctness the fatal 
discrepancy in the entry of my grannie’s marriage^ I found 


MY GREAT-ORANDMOTHER. 


469 


th6 place I to my astonishment the date of the year was now 
the same as that on the preceding page — 1747. That instant I 
awoke in the first gush of the sunrise. 

I could not help feeling even a little excited by my dream, 
and the impression of it grew upon me : I wanted to see the 
book again. I could not rest. Something seemed constantly 
urging me to go and look at it. Half to get the thing out of 
my head, I sent Styles to fetch Lilith, and for the first time 
since the final assurance of my loss, mounted her. I rode for 
Umberden Church. 

It was long after noon before I had made up my mind, and 
when, having tied Lilith to the gate, I entered the church, one 
red ray from the setting sun was nestling in the very roof. 
Knowing what I should find, yet wishing to see it again, I 
walked across to the vestry, feeling rather uncomfortable at 
the thought of prying thus alone into the parish register. 

I could almost have persuaded myself that was I dreaming 
still ; and in looking back, I can hardly in my mind separate 
the dreaming from the waking visit. 

Of course I found just what I had expected — 1748, not 
1747 — at the top of the page, and was about to replace the 
register, when the thought occurred to me, that, if the dream 
had been potent enough to bring me hither, it might yet mean 
something. I lifted the cover again. There the entry stood 
undeniably plain. This time, however, I noted two other little 
facts concerning it. 

I will just remind my reader that the entry was crushed in 
between the date of the year and the next entry — plainly 
enough to the eye ; and that there was no attestation to the 
entries of 1747. The first additional fact — and clearly an 
important one — was, that in the summing up of 1748, before 
the signature, which stood near the bottom of the cover, a 
figure had been altered. Originally it stood: “In all six 
couple,” but the six had been altered to a seven — correspond- 
ing with the actual number. This appeared proof positive 
that the first entry on the cover was a forged insertion. And 
how clumsily it had been managed! 


470 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDB. 


“ What could my grannie be about ?” I said to myself. 

It never occurred to me then that it might have been 
intended to look like a forgery. 

Still I kept staring at it, as if by very force of staring I 
could find out something. There was not the slightest sign of 
erasure or alteration beyond the instance I have mentioned. 
Yet — and here was my second note — when I compared the 
whole of the writing on the cover with the writing on the pre- 
ceding page, though it seemed the same hand, it seemed to 
have got stiflTer and shakier, as if the writer had grown old 
between. Finding nothing very suggestive in this, however, I 
fell into a dreamy mood, watching the red light, as it faded, 
up in the old, dark, distorted roof of the desolate church — ■ 
with my hand lying on the book. 

I have always had a bad habit of pulling and scratching at 
any knot or roughness in the paper of the book I happen to 
be reading ; and now, almost unconsciously, with my forefinger 
I was pulling at an edge of parchment which projected from 
the joint of the cover. When I came to myself and pro- 
ceeded to close the book, I found it would not shut properly 
because of a piece which I had curled up. Seeking to restore 
it to its former position, I fancied I saw a line or edge running 
all down the joint, and looking closer saw that these last 
entries in place of being upon a leaf of the book pasted to the 
cover in order to strengthen the binding, as I had Supposed, 
were indeed upon a leaf which was pasted to the cover, but 
one not otherwise connected with the volume. 

I now began to feel a more lively interest in the behaviour 
of my dream-grannie. Here might lie something to explain 
the hitherto inexplicable. I proceeded to pull the leaf gently 
away. It was of parchment, much thinner than the others, 
which were of vellum. I had withdrawn only a small portion 
when I saw there was writing under it. My heart began to 
beat faster. But I would not be rash. My old experience 
with parchment in the mending of my uncle’s books came to 
my aid. If I pulled at the dry skin as I had been doing, I 
might not only damage it, but destroy the writing under it. I 


MY GREAT-GRANDMOTHER. 


471 


could do nothing without water, and I did not know where to 
find any. It would be better to ride to the village of Gastford, 
somewhere about two miles oflP, put up there, and arrange for 
future proceedings. 

I did not know the way, and for a long time could see no 
one to ask. The consequence was that I made a wide round, 
and it was nearly dark before I reached the village. I thought 
it better for the present to feed Lilith, and then make the best 
of my way home. 

The next evening — I felt so like a thief that I sought the 
thievish security of the night — ^having provided myself 
with what was necessary, and borrowed a horse for Styles, I set 
out again. 


472 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


CHAPTER LXL 

THE PARISH REGISTER. 

The sky clouded as we went ; it grew very dark, and the 
wind began to blow. It threatened a storm. I told Styles a 
little of what I was about — just enough to impress on him the 
necessity for prudence. The wind ncreased, and by the time 
we gained the copse, it was roaring, and the slender hazels 
bending like a field of corn. 

“You will have enough to do with two horses,” I said. 

“ I don’t mind it, sir,” Styles answered. “ A word from me 
will quiet Miss Lilith ; and for the other, I’ve known him 
pretty well for two years past.” 

I left them tolerably sheltered in the winding lane, and 
betook myself alone to the church. Cautiously I opened the 
door, and felt my way from pew to pew, for it was quite dark. 
I could just distinguish the windows from the walls, and 
nothing more. As soon as I reached the vestry, I struck a 
light, got down the volume, and proceeded to moisten the 
parchment with a wet sponge. For some time the water made 
little impression on the old parchment, of which but one side 
could be exposed to its infiuences, and I began to fear I should 
be much longer in gaining my end than I had expected. The 
wind roared and howled about the trembling church, which 
seemed too weak with age to resist such an onslaught ; but 
when at length the skin began to grow soft and yield to my 
- gentle efibrts at removal, I became far too much absorbed in 
the simple operation, which had to be performed with all the 
gentleness and nicety of a surgical one to heed the uproar 
about me. Slowly the glutinous adhesion gave way, and 
slowly the writing revealed itself. In mingled hope and doubt 
I restrained my curiosity ; and as one teases oneself sometimes 
t>y dallying with a letter of the greatest interest, not until I 


THE PARISH REGISTER. 


473 


had folded down the parchment clear of what was manifestly 
an entry, did I bring my candle close to it, and set myself to 
read it. Then indeed I found I had reason to regard with 
respect the dream which had brought me thither. 

Kight under the 1748 of the parchment, stood on the vellum 
cover 1747. Then followed the usual blank, and then came 
an entry corresponding word for word with the other entry of 
my great grandfather and mother’s marriage. In all proba- 
bility Moldwarp Hall was mine ! Little as it could do for me 
now, I confess to a keen pang of pleasure at the thought. 

Meantime, I followed out my investigation, and gradually 
stripped the parchment off the vellum to within a couple of 
inches of the bottom of the cover. The result of knowledge 
was as follows : 

Next to the entry of the now hardly hypothetical marriage 
of my ancestors, stood the summing up of the marriages of 
1747, with the signature of the rector. I paused, and, turning 
back, counted them. Including that in which alone I was in- 
terested, I found the number given correct. Next came by it- 
self the figures 1748, and then a few more entries, followed by 
the usual summing up and signature of the rector. From this 
I turned to the leaf of parchment : there was a difference : 
upon the latter the sum was six, altered to seven ; on the for- 
mer it was five. This of course suggested further search: I 
soon found where the difference indicated lay. 

As the entry of the marriage was, on the forged leaf shifted 
up close to the forged 1748, and as the summing and signature 
had to be omitted, because they belonged to the end of 1747, a 
blank would have been left, and the writing below would have 
shone through and attracted attention, revealing the forgery 
of the whole, instead of that of the part only which was im 
tended to look a forgery. To prevent this, an altogether ficti- 
tious entry had been made — over the summing and signature. 
This, with the genuine entries faithfully copied, made of the 
five, six, which the forger had written and then blotted into a 
seven, intending to expose the entry of my ancestors’ marriage 
as a forgery, while the rest of the year’s register should look 


474 


WILPUID CUMBERMEDE. 


genuine. It took me some little trouble to clear it all up to 
my own mind, but by degrees everything settled into its place, 
and assumed an intelligible shape in virtue of its position. 

With my many speculations as to why the mechanism of 
the forgery had assumed this shape, I need not trouble my 
reader. Suffice it to say that on more than one supposition, I 
can account for it satisfactorily to myself. One other remark 
only will I make concerning it : I have no doubt it was an old 
forgery. One after another those immediately concerned in it 
had died, and there the falsehood lurked — in latent power — 
inoperative until my second visit to Umberden Church. But 
what differences might there not have been had it not started 
into activity for the brief space betwixt then and my sorrow ? 

I left the parchment still attached to the cover at the bottom, 
and, laying a sheet of paper between the formerly adhering 
surfaces, lest they should again adhere closed and replaced the 
volume. Then, looking at my watch, I found that, instead of 
an hour as I had supposed, I had been in the church three 
hours. It was nearly eleven o’clock, too late for anything 
further that night. 

When I came out, the sky was clear and the stars were shi- 
ning. The storm had blown over. Much rain had fallen. But 
when the wind ceased or the rain began, I had no recollection : 
the storm had vanished altogether from my consciousness. I 
found Styles where I had left him, smoking his pipe and lean- 
ing against Lilith, who — I cannot call her which — was feeding 
on the fine grass of the lane. The horse, he had picketed near. 
We mounted and rode home. 

The next thing was to see the rector of Umberden. He 
lived in his other parish, and thither I rode the following day to 
call upon him. I found him an old gentleman, of the squire- 
type of rector. As soon as he heard my name, he seemed to 
know who I was, and at once showed himself hospitable. 

I told him that I came to him as I might, were I a Catholic, 
to a father-confessor. This startled him a little. 

“ Don’t tell me anything I ought not to keep secret,” he said; 
and it gave me confidence in him at once. 


THE PARISH REGISTER. 


475 


** I will not,” I returned. “ The secret is purely my own. 
Whatever crime there is in it, was past punishment long before 
I was born ; and it was committed against, not by my family. 
But it is rather a long story, and I hope I shall not be tedious.” 

He assured me of his perfect leisure. 

I told him everything, from my earliest memory, which bore 
on the discovery I had at length made. He soon showed signs 
of interest ; and when I had ended the tale with the facts of 
the preceding night, he silently rose and walked about the 
room. After a few moments, he said : 

“ And what do you mean to do, Mr. Cumbermede?” 

“ Nothing,” I answered, “so long as Sir Giles is alive. He 
was kind to me when I was a boy.” 

He came up behind me when I was seated, and laid his hand 
gently on my head ; then, without a word, resumed his walk. 

“ And if you survive him, what then ?” 

“ Then I must be guided partly by circumstances,” I said. 

“ And what do you want of me ?” 

“ I want you to go with me to the church, and see the book, 
that, in case of anything happening to it, you may be a wit- 
ness concerning its previous contents.” 

“ I am too old to be the only witness,” he said. “ You 
ought to have several of your own age.” 

“ I want as few to know the secret as may be,” I answered. 

“You should have your lawyer one of them.” 

“He would never leave me alone about it,” I replied; “and 
positively I shall take no measures at present. Some day I 
hope to punish him for deserting me as he did.” 

For I had told him how Mr. Coningham had behaved. 

“ Revenge, Mr. Cumbermede ?” 

“ Not a serious one. All the punishment I hope to give 
him is but to show him the fact of the case, and leave him to 
feel as he may about it.” 

“ There can’t be much harm in that.” 

He reflected for a few moments, and then said : 

“ I will tell you what will be best. We shall go and see 
the book together. I will make an extract of both entries. 


476 


WILFRID CUMBERMED£. 


and give a description of the state of the volume, with an 
account of how the second entry — or more properly the first 
— came to be discovered. This I shall sign in the presence of 
two witnesses, who need know nothing of the contents of the 
paper. Of that you shall yourself take charge.” 

We went together to the church. The old man, after 
making a good many objections, was at length satisfied, and 
made notes for his paper. He started the question whether it 
would not be better to secure that volume at least under lock 
and key. For this I thought there was no occasion — that in 
fact it was safer where it was, and more certain of being forth- 
coming when wanted. I did suggest that the key of the 
church might be deposited in a place of safety ; but he 
answered that it had been kept there ever since he came to the 
living forty years ago, and for how long before that, he could 
not tell ; and so a change would attract attention, and possi- 
bly make some talk in the parish, which had better be 
avoided. 

Before the end of the week, he had his document ready. 
He signed it in my presence, and in that of two of his pari- 
shioners, who as witnesses appended their names and abodes. 
I have it now in my possession. I shall inclose it, with my 
great-grandfather and mother’s letters — and something besides 
— in the packet containing this history. 

That same week. Sir Giles Brotherton died. 


A FOOLISH TBIUMPH. 


477 


CHAPTER LXII. 

A FOOLISH TRIUMPH. 

I SHOULD have now laid claim to my property, but for 
Mary. To turn Sir Geoffrey with his mother and sister out 
of it, would have caused me little compunction, for they 
would still be rich enough ; I confess indeed it would have 
given me satisfaction. Nor could I say what real hurt of any 
kind it would occasion to Mary ; and if I were writing for the 
public, instead of my one reader, I know how foolishly 
incredible it must appear that for her sake I should forego 
such claims. She would, however, I trust, have been able to 
believe it without the proofe which I intend to give her. The 
fact was simply this : I could not even for my own sake bear 
the thought of taking, in any manner or degree, a position if 
but apparently antagonistic to her. My enemy was her hus- 
band : he should reap the advantage of being her husband ; 
for her sake he should for the present retain what was mine. 
So long as there should be no reason to fear his adopting a 
different policy from his father’s in respect of his tenants, I 
felt myself at liberty to leave things as they were ; for Sir 
Giles had been a good landlord, and I knew the son was 
regarded with favor in the county. Were he to turn out 
unjust or oppressive, however, then duty od my part would 
come in. But I must also remind my reader that I had no 
love for affairs ; that I had an income perfectly sufficient for 
my wants ; that, both from my habits of thought and from my 
sufferings, my regard was upon life itself— was indeed so far 
from being confined to this chrysalid beginning thereof, that I 
had lost all interest in this world save as the porch to the 
house of life. And, should I ever meet her again, in any 
possible future of being, how much rather would I not stand 


478 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


before her as one who had been even Quixotic for her sake — 
as one who for a hair’s-breadth of her interest had felt the 
sacrifice of a fortune a merely natural movement of his life I 
She would then know not merely that I was true to her, but 
that I had been true in what I professed to believe when I 
sought her favor. And if it had been a pleasure to me — call 
it a weakness, and I will not oppose the impeachment ; — cal] 
it self-pity, and I will confess to that as having a share in it ; 
but, if it had been a shadowy pleasure to me to fancy I 
suflTered for her sake, my present resolution, while it did not 
add the weight of a feather to my sufiering, did yet give me a 
similar vague satisfaction. 

I must also confess to a certain satisfaction in feeling that I 
had power over my enemy — ^power of making him feel my 
power — power of vindicating my character against him as well, 
seeing one who could thus abstain from asserting his own rights 
could hardly have been one to invade the rights of another ; 
but the enjoyment of this consciousness appeared to depend on 
my silence: if I broke that, the strength would depart from 
me ; but while I held my peace, I held my foe in an invisible 
mesh. I half deluded myself into fancying that while I kept 
my power over him unexercised, I retained a sort of pledge 
for his conduct to Mary, of which I was more than doubtful ; 
for a man with such antecedents as his, a man who had been 
capable of behaving as he had behaved to Charley, was less 
than likely to be true to his wife : he was less than likely to 
treat the sister as a lady, who to the brother had been a trai- 
torous seducer. 

I have now to confess a fault as well as an imprudence — 
punished, I believe in the results. 

The behaviour of Mr. Coningham still rankled a little in 
my bosom. From Geofirey I had never looked for anything 
but evil ; of Mr. Coningham I had expected differently, and I 
began to meditate the revenge of holding him up to himself ; I 
would punish him in a manner which, with his confidence in 
his business faculty, he must feel ; I would simply show him 
how the precipitation of selfish disappointment had led hini 


A FOOLISH TRIUMPH. 


479 


astray, and frustrated his designs. For if he had given even 
a decent attention to the matter, he would have found in the 
forgery itself hints sufficient to suggest the desirableness of 
further investigation. 

I had not however concluded upon anything, when one day 
I accidentally met him, and we had a little talk about business, 
for he continued to look after the rent of my field. He 
informed me that Sir Geofirey Brotherton had been doing all 
he could to get even temporary possession of the park, as we 
called it ; and, although I said nothing of it to Mr. Coning- 
ham, my suspicion is, that, had he succeeded, he would, at the 
risk of a law-suit in which he would certainly have been cast, 
have ploughed it up. He told me also that Clara was in poor 
health ; she who had looked as if no blight could ever touch 
her, had broken down utterly. The shadow of her sorrow was 
plain enough on the face of her father, and his confident man- 
ner had a little yielded, although he was the old man still. 
His father had died a little before Sir Giles. The new baronet 
had not ofiered him the succession. 

I asked him to go with me yet once more to Umberden 
Church — for I wanted to show him something he had over- 
looked in the register — ^not, I said, that it would be of the 
slightest furtherance to his former hopes. He agreed at once, 
already a little ashamed perhaps of the way in which he had 
abandoned me. Before we parted we made an appointment to 
meet at the church. 

We went at once to the vestry. I took down the volume, 
and laid it before him. He opened it, with a curious look at 
me first. But the moment he lifted the cover, its condition at 
once attracted and as instantly riveted his attention. He 
gave me one glance more, in which questions and remarks and 
exclamations numberless lay in embryo ; then turning to the 
book, was presently absorbed, first in reading the genuine 
entry, next in comparing it with the forged one. 

“ Right after all !’^ he exclaimed at length. 

In what T* I asked. In dropping me without a word as 
if I had been an impostor ? In forgetting that you yourself 


480 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


had raised in me the hopes whose discomfiture you took as a 
personal injury ?” 

“ My dear sir he stammered in an expostulatory tone, 
“ you must make allowance. It was a tremendous disappoint- 
ment to me.'’ 

“ I cannot say I felt it quite so much myself, but at least 
you owed me an apology for having misled me.” 

“ I had not misled you,” he retorted angrily, pointing to the 
register, — “ There !” 

“ You left me to find that out though. You took no further 
pains in the matter.” 

“How did you find it out?” he asked, clutching at a 
change in the tone of the conversation. 

I said nothing of my dream, but I told him everything else 
concerning the discovery. When I had finished — 

“ It’s all plain sailing now,” he cried. “ There is not an 
obstacle in the way. I will set the thing in motion the instant 
I get home. — It will be a victory worth achieving !” he added, 
rubbing his hands. 

“Mr. Coningham, I have not the slightest intention of 
moving in the matter,” I said. 

His face fell. 

“ You do not mean — when you hold them in your very hands 
— to throw away every advantage of birth and fortune, and be 
a nobody in the world ?” 

“ Infinite advantages of the kind you mean, Mr. Coningham, 
could make me not one whit more than I am : they might 
make me less.” 

“ Come, come,” he expostulated ; “ you must not allow dis- 
appointment to upset your judgment of things.” 

“ My judgment of things lies deeper than any disappoint- 
ment I have yet had,” I replied. “ My uncle’s teaching has 
at last begun to bear fruit in me.” 

“ Your uncle was a fool !” he exclaimed. 

“ But for my uncle’s sake, I would knock you down for 
daring to couple such a word with him” 

He turned on me with a sneer. His eyes had receded in his 


A FOOLISH TRIUMPH. 


481 


head, and in his rage he grinned. The old ape-face, which had 
lurked in my memory ever since the time I first saw him, came 
out so plainly that I started: the child had read his face 
aright ! the following judgment of the man had been wrong ! 
the child’s fear had not imprinted a false eidolon upon the 
growing brain. 

“ What right had you,” he said, “ to bring me all this way 
for such tomfoolery ?” 

“I told you it would not further your wishes. But 
who brought me here for nothing first?” I added, most 
foolishly. 

“I was myself deceived. I did not intend to deceive 
you.” 

“ I know that. God forbid I should be unjust to you. But 
you have proved to me that your friendship was all a pretence; 
that your private ends were all your object. When you dis- 
covered that I could not serve those, you dropped me like a 
bit of glass you had taken for a diamond. Have you any 
right to grumble if I give you the discipline of a passing 
shame ?” 

“ Mr. Cumbermede,” he said, through his teeth, “ you will 
repent this.” 

I gave him no answer, and he left the church in haste. 
Having replaced the register, I was following at my leisure, 
when I heard sounds that made me hurry to the door. Lilith 
was plunging and rearing, and pulling at the bridle, which I 
had thrown over one of the spiked bars of the gate. Another 
moment and she must have broken loose, or dragged the gate 
upon her — more likely the latter, for the bridle was a new one 
with broad reins — when some frightful injury would in all pro- 
bability have been the consequence to herself. But a word 
from me quieted her, and she stood till I came up. Every 
inch of her was trembling. I suspected at once, and in a 
moment discovered that Mr. Coningham had struck her with 
his whip : there was a big weal on the fine skin of her hip and 
across her croup. She shrunk like a hurt child when my hand 
approached the injured part, but moved neither hoof nor head. 

31 


482 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Having patted and petted and consoled her a little, I mounted 
and rode after Mr. Coningham. Nor was it difficult to over- 
take him, for he was going a footpace. He was stooping 
in his saddle, and when I drew near, I saw that he was look- 
ing very pale. I did not, however, suspect that he was in 
pain. 

“It was a cowardly thing to strike the poor dumb animal,” 
I cried. 

“ You would have struck her yourself,” he answered with a 
curse, “if she had broken your leg.” 

I rode nearer. I knew well enough that she would not have 
kicked him if he had not struck her first ; and I could see 
that his leg was not broken ; but evidently he was in great 
suffering. 

“I am very sorry,” I said. “Can I help you?” 

“Go to the devil,” he groaned. 

I am ashamed to say the answer made me so angry that I 
spoke the truth. 

“Don^t suppose you deceive me,” I said. “I know well 
enough my mare did not kick you before you struck her. Then 
she lashed out of course.” 

I waited for no reply, but turned and rode back to the 
church the door of which, in my haste, I had left open. I 
locked it, replaced the key, and then rode quietly home. 

But as I went, I began to feel that I had doue wrong. No 
doubt Mr. Coningham deserved it, but the law was not in my 
hands. No man has a right to punish another. Vengeance 
belongs to a higher region, and the vengeance of God is a 
very different thing from the vengeance of man. However it 
may be softened with the name of retribution, revenge runs into 
all our notions of justice; and until we love purely, so it must 
ever be. 

All I had gained was self-rebuke, and another enemy. 
Having reached home, I read the Manual of Epictetus right 
through before I laid it down, and, if it did not teach me to 
love my enemies, it taught me at least to be ashamed of my- 
self. Then I wrote to Mr. Coningham, saying I was sorry I 


A FOOLISH TRIUMPH. 


483 


had spoken to him as I did, and begging him to let by-gones 
be by-gones ; assuring him that if ever I moved in the matter 
of our difference, he should be the first to whom I applied for 
assistance. 

He returned me no answer. 


484 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDa 


CHAPTER LXIIL 

A COLLISION. 

And now came a dreary time of reaction. There seemed 
nothing left for me to do, and I felt listless and weary. Some- 
thing kept urging me to get away and hide myself, and I soon 
made up my mind to yield to the impulse and go abroad. My 
intention was to avoid cities, and, wandering from village to 
village, lay my soul hare to the healing influences of Nature. 
As to any healing in the power of Time, I despised the old 
bald-pate as a quack who performed his seeming cures at the 
expense of the whole body. The better cures attributed to him 
are not his at all, but produced by the operative causes whose 
servant he is. A thousand holy balms require his services for 
their full action, but they, and not he, are the saving powers. 
Along with Time I ranked, and with absolute hatred shrunk 
from — all those means which ofiered to cure me by making me 
forget. From a child, I had a horror of forgetting ; it always 
seemed to me like a loss of being, like a hollow scooped out of 
my very existence — almost like the loss of identity. At times 
I even shrunk from going to sleep, so much did it seem like 
yielding to an absolute death — a death so deep that the visible 
death is but a picture or type of it. If I could have been sure 
of dreaming, it would have been difierent, but in the uncer- 
tainty it seemed like consenting to nothingness. That one who 
thus felt should ever have been tempted to suicide, will reveal 
how painful if not valueless his thoughts and feelings — his con- 
scious life — must have grown to him ; and that the only thing 
which withheld him from it should be the fear that no death, 
but a more intense life might be the result, will reveal it yet 
more clearly. That in that sleep I might at least dream — there 
was the rub. 

All such relief, in a word, as might come of a lowering of 


A COLLISION. 


485 


my life, eitlier physically, morally, or spiritually, I hated, de- 
tested, despised. The man who finds solace for a wounded 
heart in self-indulgence, may indeed be capable of angelic vir- 
tues, but in the meantime his conduct is that of the devils who 
went into the swine rather than be bodiless. The man who 
can thus be consoled for the loss of a woman, could never have 
been worthy of her, possibly would not have remained true to 
her beyond the first delights of possession. The relief to which 
I could open my door, must be such alone as would operate 
through the enlarging and elevating of what I recognized as 
myself. Whatever would make me greater, so that my torture, 
intensified it might well be, should yet have room to dash itself 
hither and thither without injuring the walls of my being, 
would be welcome. If I might become so great that, my grief 
yet stinging me to agony, the infinite I of me should remain 
pure and calm, God-loving and man-cherishing, then I should 
be saved. God might be able to do more for me — I could not 
tell : I looked for no more. I would myself be such as to in- 
close my pain in a mighty sphere of out-spacing life, in rela- 
tion to which even such sorrow as mine should be but a little 
thing. Such deliverance alone, I say, could I consent with 
myself to accept, and such alone, I believed, would God offer 
me — for such alone seemed worthy of him, and such alone 
seemed not unworthy of me. 

The help that Nature could give me, I judged to be of this 
ennobling kind. For either Nature was nature in virtue of 
having been born {nata) of God, or she was but a phantasm 
of my own brain — against which supposition the nature in me 
protested with the agony of a tortured man. To Nature then 
I would go. Like the hurt child who folds himself in the 
skirt of his mother’s velvet garment, I would fold myself in 
the robe of Deity. 

But to give honor and gratitude where both are due, I must 
here confess obligation with a willing and thankful heart. 
The Excursion of Wordsworth was published ere I was born, 
but only since I left college had I made acquaintance with it ; 
so long does it take for the light of a new star to reach a 


486 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


distant world I To this book I owe so much that to me it 
would alone justify the conviction that Wordsworth will never 
be forgotten. That he is no longer the fashion, militates 
nothing against his reputation. We, the old ones, hold fast 
by him for no sentimental reminiscence of the fashion of our 
youth, but simply because his humanity has come into contact 
with ours. The men of the new generation have their new 
loves and worships : it remains to be seen to whom the worthy 
amongst them will turn long ere the frosts of age begin to 
gather and the winds of the human autumn to blow. Words- 
worth will recede through the gliding ages until with the 
greater Chaucer, and the greater Shakspeare, and the greater 
Milton, he is yet a star in the constellated crown of 
England. 

Before I was able to leave home, however, a new event 
occurred. 

I received an anonymous letter, in a handwriting I did not 
recognize. Its contents were as follows, — 

“ Sir. — Treachery is intended you. If you have anything 
worth watching, watch it.” 

For one moment — so few were the places in which through 
my possessions I was vulnerable — ^I fancied the warning might 
point to Lilith, but I soon dismissed the idea. I could make 
no inquiries, for it had been left an hour before my return 
from a stroll by an unknown messenger. I could think of 
nothing besides the register, and if this was what my corre- 
spondent aimed at, I had less reason to be anxious concerning 
it, because of the attested copy, than my informant probably 
knew. Still its safety was far from being a matter of in- 
difierence to me, I resolved to ride over to XJmberden 
Church and see if it was as I had left it. 

The twilight was fast thickening into darkness when I 
entered the gloomy building. There was light enough, 
however, to guide my hand to the right volume, and by 
carrying it to the door I was able to satisfy myself that it was 
as I had left it. 


A COLLISION. 


487 


Thinking over the matter once more as I stood, I could not 
help wishing that the book was out of danger just for the 
present; but there was hardly a place in the bare church 
where it was possible to conceal it. At last I thought of one 
— ^half groped my way to the pulpit, ascended its creaking 
stair, lifted the cushion of the seat, and laid the book, which 
was thin, open in the middle, and flat on its face, under it. 
I then locked the door, mounted, and rode ofi*. 

It was now more than dusk. Lilith was frolicsome, and, 
rejoicing in the grass under her feet, broke into a quick canter 
along the noiseless, winding lane. Suddenly there was a 
great shock, and I lay senseless. 

I came to myself under the stinging blows of a whip, only 
afterwards recognized as such however. I sprung staggering 
to my feet, and rushed at the dim form of an assailant, with 
such a sudden and I suppose unexpected assault that he fell 
under me. Had he not fallen I should have had little chance 
with him, for, as I now learned by his voice, it was Sir 
Geofirey Brotherton. 

“Thief! Swindler! Sneak!” he cried, making a last 
harmless blow at me as he fell. 

A ll the wild beast in my nature was roused. I had no 
weapon — ^not even a whip, for Lilith never needed one. It 
was well, for what I might have done, in the first rush of 
blood to my reviving brain, I dare hardly imagine. I seized 
him by the throat with such fury that, though far the stronger 
he had no chance as he lay. I kneeled on his chest. He 
struggled furiously, but could not force my gripe from his 
throat. I soon perceived that I was strangling him, and 
tightened my grasp. 1 

His efibrts were already growing feebler, when I became 
aware of a soft touch apparently trying to take hold of my 
hair. Glancing up without relaxing my hold, I saw the white 
head of Lilith close to mine. Was it the whiteness — ^was it 
the calmness of the creature — I cannot pretend to account for 
the fact, but the same instant before my mind's eye rose the 
vision of one standing speechless before his accusers, bearing 


488 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


on his form the marks of ruthless blows. I did not then 
remember that just before I came out I had been gazing, as I 
often gazed, upon an Ecce Homo of Albert Durer’s that hung 
in my room. Immediately my heart awoke within me. My 
whole being still trembling with passionate struggle and grati- 
fied hate, a rush of human pity swept across it. I took my 
hand from my enemy’s throat, rose, withdrew some paces, and 
burst into tears. I could have embraced him, but I dared not 
even minister to him, for the insult it Avould appear. He did 
not at once rise, and when he did, he stood for a few moments, 
half-unconscious, I think, staring at me. Coming to himself, 
he felt for and found his whip — I thought with the intention 
of attacking me again, but he moved towards his horse, which 
was quietly eating the grass now wet with dew. Gathering its 
bridle from around its leg, he mounted, and rode back the way 
he had come. 

I lingered for a while utterly exhausted. I was trembling 
in every limb. The moon rose and began to shed her low 
yellow light over the hazel copse, filling the lane with bright- 
ness and shadow. Lilith, seeming in her whiteness to gather 
a tenfold share of the light upon herself, was now feeding as 
gently as if she had known nothing of the strife, and I con- 
gratulated myself that the fall had not injured her. But as 
she took a step forward in her feeding, I discovered to my 
dismay that she was quite lame. For my own part I was now 
feeling the ache of numerous and severe bruises. When I 
took Lilith by the bridle to lead her away, I found that 
neither of us could manage more than two miles an hour. I 
was very uneasy about her. There was nothing for it however 
but make the best of our way to Gastford. It was no little 
satisfaction to think as we hobbled along, that the accident 
had happened through no carelessness of mine beyond that of 
cantering in the dark, for I was on my own side of the road. 
Had Geoffrey been on his, narrow as the lane was, we might 
have passed without injury. 

It was so late when we reached Gastford, that we had to 
rouse the ostler before I could get Lilith attended to. I 


A COLLISION. 


489 


bathed the injured leg, of which the shoulder seemed wrenched ; 
and having fed her, but less plentifully than usual, I left her 
to her repose. In the morning she was considerably better, 
but I resolved to leave her where she was, and sending a 
messenger for Styles to come and attend to her, I hired a gig, 
and went to call on my new friend, the rector of Umberden. 

I told him all that had happened, and where I had left the 
volume. He said he would have a chest made in which to 
secure the whole register, and, meanwhile, would himself go to 
the church and bring the volume home with him. It is safe 
enough now, as any one may find who wishes to see it — though 
the old man has long passed away. 

Lilith remained at Gastford a week before I judged it safe 
for her to come home. The injury however turned out to be 
a not very serious one. 

Why should I write of my poor mare — but that she was 
once hers all for whose hoped perusal I am writing this ? No, 
there is even a better reason : I shall never, to all my eternity, 
forget, even if I should never see her again, which I do not 
for a moment believe, what she did for me that evening. 
Surely she deserves to appear in her own place in my story ! 

Of course I was exercised in my mind as to who had sent 
me the warning. There could be no more doubt that I had 
hit what it intended, and had possibly preserved the register 
from being once more tampered with. I could think only of 
one. I have never had an opportunity of inquiring, and for 
her sake I should never have asked the question, but I have 
little doubt it was Clara. Who else could have had a chance 
of making the discovery, and at the same time would have 
cared to let me know it ? Also she would have cogent reason 
for keeping such a part in the affair a secret. Probably she 
had heard her father informing Geoffrey ; but he might have 
done so with no worse intention than had informed his previous 
policy. 


490 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDB. 


CHAPTER LXIV. 

YET ONCE. 

I AM drawing my story to a close. Almost all that followed 
bears so exclusively upon my internal history, that I will write 
hut one incident more of it. I have roamed the world, and 
reaped many harvests. In the deepest agony I have never 
refused the consolations of Nature or of Truth. I have never 
knowingly accepted any founded in falsehood, in forgetfulness, 
or in distraction. Let such as have no hope in God drink of 
what Lethe they can find ; to me it is a river of Hell and 
altogether abominable. I could not be content even to forget 
my sins. There can he but one deliverance from them, 
namely, that God and they should come together in my soul. 
In his presence I shall serenely face them. Without him I 
dare not think of them. With God a man can confront any- 
thing; without God, he is but the withered straw which the 
sickle of the reaper has left standing on a wintry field.' But 
to forget them would be to cease and begin anew, which to one 
aware of his immortality is a horror. 

If comfort profound as the ocean has not yet overtaken and 
infolded me, I see how such may come — ^perhaps will come. 
It must be by the enlarging of my whole being in truth, in 
God, so as to give room for the storm of rage yet not destroy ; 
for the sorrow to brood yet not kill ; for the sunshine of love 
to return after the east wind and black frost of bitterest disap- 
pointment ; for the heart to feel the uttermost tenderness while 
the arms go not forth to embrace ; for a mighty heaven of the 
unknown, crowded with the stars of endless possibilities, to 
dawn when the sun of love has vanished, and the moon of its 
memory is too ghastly to give any light : it is comfort such 
and thence that I think will one day possess me. Already 
has not its aurora brightened the tops of my snow-covered 


YET ONCE. 


491 


mountains ? And if yet my valleys lie gloomy and forlorn, is 
not light on the loneliest peak a sure promise of the coming 
day? 

Only once again have I looked on Mary’s fece. I will re- 
cord the occasion, and then drop my pen. 

About five years after I left home, I happened in my wan- 
derings to be in one of my favorite Swiss valleys — high and 
yet sheltered. I rejoiced to be far up in the mountains, yet 
behold the inaccessible peaks above me — mine, though not to 
be trodden by foot of mine — my heart’s own, though never to 
yield me a moment’s outlook from their lofty brows ; for I 
was never strong enough to reach one mighty summit. It 
was enough for me that they sent me down the glad streams 
from the cold bosoms of their glaciers — ^the offspring of the 
sun and the snow ; that I too beheld the stars to which they 
were nearer than I. 

One lovely morning, I had wandered a good way from the 
village — a place little frequented by visitors, where I had a 
lodging in the house of the syndic — ^when I was overtaken by 
one of the sudden fogs which so frequently render those upper 
regions dangerous. There was no path to guide me bach to 
my temporary home, but, a hundred yards or so beneath where 
I had been sitting, lay that which led down to one of the best 
known villages of the canton, where I could easily find shelter. 
I made haste to descend. 

After a couple of hours’ walking, during which the fog kept 
following me, as if hunting me from its lair, I at length ar- 
rived at the level of the valley, and was soon in one of those 
large hotels which in the summer are crowded as bee-hives, 
and in the winter forsaken as a ruin. The season for travel- 
lers was drawing to a close, and the house was full of home- 
ward bound guests. 

For the mountains will endure but a season of intrusion. 
If travellers linger too long within their hospitable gates, 
their humor changes, and, with fierce winds and snow and 
bitter sleet, they will drive them forth, preserving their winter 
privacy for the bosom friends of their mistress. Nature. 


492 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


Many is the winter since those of my boyhood which I have 
spent amongst the Alps; and in such solitude I have ever 
found the negation of all solitude, the one absolute Presence. 
David communed with his own heart on his bed and was 
still — there finding God : communing with my own heart in 
the winter-valleys of Switzerland I found at least what made 
me cry out : “ Surely this is the house of God ; this is the 
gate of heaven!’^ I would not be supposed to fancy that 
God is in mountains and not in plains — that God is in the 
solitude and not in the city : in any region harmonious with 
its condition and necessities, it is easier for the heart to be still, 
and in its stillness to hear the still small voice. 

Dinner was going on at the table d’hote. It was full, but a 
place was found for me in a bay window. Turning to the one 
side, I belonged to the great world, represented by the Ger- 
mans, Americans, and English, with a Frenchman and Italian 
here and there, filling the long table ; turning to the other, I 
knew myself in a temple of the Most High, so huge that it 
seemed empty nf men. The great altar of a mighty mountain 
rose, massy as a world, and etherial as a thought, into the up- 
turned gulf of the twilight air — its snowy peak, ever as I turned 
to look, mounting up and up to its repose. I had been playing 
with my own soul, spinning it between the sun and the moon 
as it were, and watching now the golden and now the silvery 
side, as I glanced from the mountain to the table and again 
from the table to the mountain, when all at once I discovered 
that I was searching the mountain for something — I did not 
know what. Whether any tones had reached me, I cannot tell — 
a man’s mind may, even through his senses, be marvellously 
moved without knowing whence the influence comes; — ^but 
there I was searching the face of the mountain for something, 
with a want which had not begun to explain itself. From 
base to peak my eyes went flitting and resting and wandering 
again upwards. At last they reached the snowy crown, from 
which they fell into the infinite blue beyond. Then, suddenly, 
the unknown something I wanted was clear. The same 
moment, I turned to the table. Almost opposite was a face — 


YET ONCE. 


493 


pallid, with parted lips and fixed eyes — gazing at me. Then 
I knew those eyes had been gazing at me all the time I had 
been searching the face of the mountain. For one moment 
they met mine and rested ; for one moment, I felt as if I must 
throw myself at her feet, and clasp them to my heart ; but she 
turned her eyes away, and I rose and left the house. 

The mist was gone, and the moon was rising. I walked up 
the mountain path towards my village. But long ere I 
reached it, the sun was rising ; with his first arrow of slender- 
est light, the tossing waves of my spirit began to lose their 
white tops, and sink again towards a distant calm ; and ere I 
saw the village from the first point of vision, I had made the 
following verses. They are the last I will set down. 

I know that I cannot move thee 
To an echo of my pain, 

Or a thrill of the storming trouble 
That racks my soul and brain ; 

That our hearts through all the ages 
Shall never sound in tune; 

That they meet no more in their cycles 
Than the parted sun and moon. 

But if ever a spirit flashes 
Itself on another soul, 

One day, in thy stillness, a vapor 
Shall round about thee roll ! 

And the lifting of the vapor 
Shall reveal a world of pain. 

Of frosted suns, and moons that wander 
Through misty mountains of rain. 

Thou shalt know me for one live instant — 

Thou shalt know me— and yet not love : 

I would not have thee troubled. 

My cold, white-feathered dove. 


I would only once come near thee — 
Myself, and not my form ; 

Then away in the distance wander, 
A slow-dissolving storm. 


494 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


The vision should pass in vapor, 
That melt in aether again j 
Only a something linger — 

Not pain, but the shadow of pain* 

And I should know that thy spirit 
On mine one look had sent j 
And glide away from thy knowledge^ 
And try to be half-content. 


CONCLUSION. 


495 


CHAPTER LXV. 

CONCLUSION. 

The ebbing tide that leaves bare the shore, swells the heaps 
of the central sea. The tide of life ebbs from this body of 
mine, soon to lie on the shore of life like a stranded wreck, 
but the murmur of the waters that break upon no strand is in 
my ears ; to join the waters of the infinite me, mine is ebbing 
away. 

Whatever has been his will is well — grandly well — well even 
for that in me which feared, and in those very respects in 
which it feared that it might not be well. The whole being 
of me past and present shall say : it is infinitely well, and I 
would not have it otherwise. Rather than it should not be as 
it is, I would go back to the world and this body of which I 
grew weary, and encounter yet again all that met me on my 
journey. Yes — ^final submission of my will to the All-will — I 
would meet it knowing what was coming. Lord of me. Father 
of Jesus Christ, will this suffice ? Is my faith enough yet ? 
I say it, not having beheld what thou hast in store — not know- 
ing what I shall be — not even absolutely certain that thou art 
— confident only that, if thou be, such thou must be. 

The last struggle is before me. But I have passed already 
through so many valleys of death itself, where the darkness 
was not only palpable, but choking and stinging, that I cannot 
greatly fear that which holds but the shadow of death. For 
what men call death, is but its shadow. Death never comes 
near us ; it lies behind the back of God ; he is between it and 
us. If he were to turn his back upon us, the death which no 
imagination can shadow forth, would lap itself around us, and 
we should be — we should not know what. 

At night I lie wondering how it would feel ; and, but that 
God will be with me, I would rather be slain suddenly, than 


496 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


lie still and await the change. The growing weakness, ushered 
in, it may be, by long agony ; the alienation from things about 
me, while I am yet amidst them ; the slow rending of the 
bonds which make this body a home, so that it turns half alien, 
while yet some bonds unsevered hold the live thing fluttering 

in its worm-eaten cage but God knows me and my house, 

and I need not speculate or forebode. When it comes, death 

will prove as natural as birth. Bethink thee. Lord nay, 

thou never forgettest. It is because thou thinkest and feelest 
that I think and feel ; it is on thy deeper consciousness that 
mine ever floats ; thou knowest my frame, and rememberest 
that I am dust ; do with me as thou wilt. Let me take cen- 
turies to die if so thou wiliest, for thou wilt be with me. Only 
if an hour should come when thou must seem to forsake me, 
watch me all the time, lest self-pity should awake, and I 
should cry that thou wast dealing hardly with me. For when 
thou hidest thy face, the world is a corpse, and I am a live 
soul fainting within it. 

****** 

Thus far had I written, and was about to close with certain 
words of Job which are to me like the trumpet of the resur- 
rection, when the news reached me that Sir Geoffrey Brother- 
ton was dead. He leaves no children, and the property is 
expected to pass to a distant branch of the family. Mary will 
have to leave Moldwarp Hall. 

* * * * * * 

I have been up to London to my friend Marston — for it is 
years since Mr. Coningham died. I have laid everything 
before him, and left the affair in his hands. He is so confident 
in my cause, that he offers, in case my means should fail me 
to find what is necessary himself ; but he is almost as confident 
of a speedy settlement. 

And now, for the first time in my life, I am about, shall I 
say, to court society ? At least I am going to London, about 
to give and receive invitations, and cultivate the acquaintance 
of those whose appearance and conversation attract me. 

I have not a single relative, to my knowledge, in the world. 


CONCLUSION. 497 

and I am free, beyond question, to leave whatever property I 
have or may have to whomsoever I please. 

My design is this : if I succeed in my suit, I will offer Mold- 
warp to Mary for her lifetime. She is greatly beloved in the 
county, and has done much for the laborers, nor upon her own 
lands only. K she had the full power she would do yet better. 
But of course it is very doubtful whether she will accept it. 
Should she decline it, I shall try to manage it myself— -leaving 
it to her, with reversion to the man, whoever he may be, whom 
I shall choose to succeed her. 

What sort of a man I shall endeavor to find, I think my 
reader will understand. I will not describe him, beyond saying 
that he must above all things be just, generous, and free from 
the petty prejudices of the country gentleman. He must 
understand that property involves service to every human soul 
that lives or labors upon it — the service of the elder brother 
to his less burdened yet more enduring and more helpless 
brothers and sisters ; that for the lives of all such he has in 
his degree to render account. For surely God never meant to 
uplift any man at the expense of his fellows ; but to uplift him 
that he might be strong to minister, as a wise friend and ruler, 
to their highest and best needs — first of all by giving them 
the justice which will be recognized as such by him before 
whom a man is his brother’s keeper, and becomes a Cain in 
denying it. 

Lest Lady Brotherton, however, should like to have some- 
thing to give away, I leave my former will as it was. It is in 
Marston’s hands. 

:|e ♦ * * JjJ »K 

Would I marry her now, if I might ? I cannot tell. The 
thought rouses no passionate flood within me. Mighty spaces 
of endless possibility and endless result open before me. 
Death is knocking at my door. 

No — ^no ; I will be honest, and lay it to no half reasons, 
however wise. — I would rather meet her then first, when she 
is clothed in that new garment called by St. Paul the spiritua-l 
32 


498 


WILFRID CUMBERMEDE. 


body. That, Greoffrey has never touched ; over that he has 
no claim. 

But if the loveliness of her character should have purified 
his, and drawn and bound his soul to hers ? « 

Father, fold me in thyself. The storm so long still, awakes ; 
once more it flutters its flerce pinions. Let it not swing 
itself aloft in the air of my spirit. I dare not think, not 
merely lest thought should kindle into agony, but lest I 
should fail to rejoice over the lost and found. But my heart 
is in thy hand. Need I school myself to bow to an imagined 
decree of thine ? Is it not enough that, when I shall know 
a thing for thy will, I shall then be able to say : Thy will be 
done? It is not enough; I need more. School thou my 
heart so to love thy will, that in aU calmness I leave to think 
what may or may not be its choice, and rest in its holy self. 

She has sent for me. I go to her. I will not think before- 
hand what I shall say. 

Something within tells me that a word from her would 
explain all that sometimes even now seems so inexplicable as 
hers. Will she speak that word? Shall I pray her for that 
word ? I know nothing. The pure Will be done I 


THE END. 


333 92 





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